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HOW THE FRENCH BOY 
LEARNS TO WRITE 

A STUDY IN THE TEACHING 
OF THE MOTHER TONGUE 



BY 

ROLLO WALTER BROWN 

PROFESSOR OF RHETORIC AND COMPOSITION 
IN WABASH COLLEGE 




CAMBRIDGE 

HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS 

1915 



LS/S77 
• Fl Sj 



COPYRIGHT, 191 5 
HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS 

All rights reserved, including that of 
translation into foreign languages 




JAN 10 1916 



©CU420456 
%*: f , 



CAO 



PREFACE 

Soon after I began teaching English nine years ago, my 
acquaintance with several French textbooks on composition 
led me to believe that it might be profitable to study the 
manner in which the French deal with the entire problem of 
learning to write. In 1910 Wabash College granted me 
a year's leave of absence for the prosecution of such a study; 
and in 191 2 I found it possible to carry out my original 
plans. Accordingly I went to France and devoted the 
academic year to visiting classrooms in both the primary 
and secondary school systems, to holding conferences with 
teachers and other persons interested in education, and to 
such complementary investigation as seemed important. 
My observations were made in schools for boys. 

The current programmes of study in the different subjects 
taught in the French secondary schools have already been 
translated into English; and some parts have been trans- 
lated repeatedly. Moreover, the volume of Instructions 
issued in 1909 for the guidance of secondary teachers has 
been translated and published by the British Board of 
Education as a supplement to the programmes. So far as 
I know, the present programmes for primary schools have 
not been translated. I have made my own translations of 
all programmes and documents, and of all illustrative pas- 
sages except in one or two instances mentioned in footnotes. 

A study based so largely on first-hand observation is pos- 
sible only through the kindness and the cooperation of a 
great number of educational officers and a still greater 
number of teachers. To the many who assisted me so 



iv PREFACE 

generously that my labor was not only fruitful but singu- 
larly enjoyable, I desire to extend my heartiest thanks. I 
am especially indebted to M. Guist'hau, formerly Ministre 
de V Instruction publique et des Beaux- Arts, for letters that 
opened the way to the different academies of France, and for 
information of many kinds; to M. Liard, vice-recteur de 
VAcademie de Paris, M. Lyon, recteur de VAcademie de 
Lille, M. Payot, recteur de VAcademie d'Aix, and M. Joubin, 
recteur de VAcademie de Lyon, for authorization to visit 
schools in their respective academies; to M. Gustave Lanson, 
professeur a la Sorbonne, for many valuable suggestions about 
beginning my work; to M. Henri Dupre, professeur au Lycee 
Carnot, Paris, M. Henri Alline, professeur au Lycee Ampere, 
Lyon, M. Paul Marie-Cardine, professeur adjoint au Lycee 
Janson de Sailly, Paris, M. Faye, professeur a VEcole 
Jean-Baptiste Say, Paris, and M. Mercier, instituteur 
public, Paris, for their very substantial assistance in my 
examination of the written work of different classes of 
pupils; to M. Kuhn, professeur a VEcole normale d'institu- 
teurs, Paris, for certain information concerning the study of 
the mother tongue in the normal schools; to M. J. Bezard, 
professeur au Lycee Eoche, Versailles, and M. Lucien La- 
vault, proviseur du Lycee Gassendi, Digne, for unexampled 
thoughtfulness about numerous matters of importance; and 
to M. Charles Wagner, for his stimulating interest. 

I am likewise deeply indebted to Professor G. L. Kit- 
tredge, Dean L. B. R. Briggs, and Professor G. P. Baker, of 
Harvard University, for their encouragement and good 
counsel when I was preparing to make this study; to Pro- 
fessor Raymond Weeks, of Columbia University, for many 
letters of introduction; to Professor F. E. Farrington, of 
Columbia University, not only for the profit I derived from 
reading his books on French education before I went to 



PREFACE v 

France, but also for personal suggestions; to Professor 
N. W. Barnes, of De Pauw University, and Professor J. S. 
Kenyon, of Butler College, for reading parts of the manu- 
script; to Dr. C. J. Masseck, of Washington University, for 
his unfailing interest and searching criticism; to my col- 
leagues, Dr. Francis Daniels and Mr. Harold Hawk, for 
generous assistance of many kinds; and finally, to my wife, 
not only for aid with notes and manuscript, but also for her 
sustaining inspiration. 

R. W. B. 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER I 



PAGE 

Introduction 3 



CHAPTER II 

The Courses of Study in the Mother Tongue n 

I. The Bearing op the Educational System .... n 

II. The Programmes 14 

CHAPTER III 

Composition 46 

I. The French Attitude toward Composition .... 46 

II. Preliminaries to Composition 48 

A. Enlarging and Organizing the Vocabulary . . 48 

B. Dictation 57 

III. Material por Themes 63 

A. The Emphasis Placed on Good Material ... 63 

B. The Kind op Material Assigned 65 

C. The Preparation op Material 75 

IV. The Criticism of Themes 79 

A. Ideals in Criticism 79 

B. The Method of Criticism 81 

C. The Spirit op the Criticism 83 

D. Economy in Grading Themes 84 

V. The Writing and Speaking in Other Subjects . . 86 

VI. Summary 89 

vii 



viii CONTENTS 

CHAPTER IV 

Grammar 90 

I. The Predominant Purpose in Teaching Grammar . go 
II. The Early Beginning 91 

III. Simplification 93 

A. In Subject-Matter 93 

B. In Classroom Exercises 94 

C. In Nomenclature 96 

IV. The Close Relation oe Grammar to Other Work . 99 

A. Through the Internal Arrangement oe Class 
Periods 100 

B. Through Oral Exercises 102 

C. Through the Use oe Complete Passages of 
Prose 103 

D. Through Emphasis on the Sentence 106 

V. The Influence of the Inductive Method . . . .107 

VI. Historical Grammar no 

CHAPTER V 

Reading and Literature 114 

I. What the Pupil Reads 114 

II. How the Pupil Reads 118 

A. In the Lower Grades 119 

B. In the Upper Grades: Explication of Texts . 123 

1. The Method of Explication 123 

2. An Example of Explication 129 

3. The Value of Explication 148 

III. Memory Exercises in Reading and Literature . . 149 

IV. The Relation of Literature to Theme- Writing . 152 

CHAPTER VI 

Foreign Languages 155 

I. Latin 155 

A. Classroom Method 156 

B. The Dominant Purpose in Teaching Latin . . 159 
II. The Modern Languages 162 

A. The Direct Method 163 

B. The Direct Method and the Mother Tongue 170 



CONTENTS ix 

CHAPTER VII 

The French Boy's Teacher 174 

I. The Preparation of the Teacher 175 

A. Preparation in the Primary School System . 175 

B. Preparation in the Secondary School System 179 

II. The Teacher's Position 185 

A. His Relation to the State 185 

B. His Standing in the Community 186 

C. His Life within the School 187 

D. Salaries 191 

E. Pensions 194 

III. Professional Characteristics of the Teacher . . 196 

A. Conscientiousness 197 

B. Enthusiasm 198 

C. Ability to Question 199 

D. Skill in Incidental Teaching 201 

IV. The Teacher and his School 203 

CHAPTER VIII 

Organized Language Tradition 208 

I. Organized Tradition in France 208 

II. The Lack of Organized Tradition in America . .210 

III. Adjustments Necessary to Organized Tradition . 212 

A. In Our Educational System 213 

B. In Pedagogical Practice 216 

C. In Finding and Preparing Teachers 229 

D. In the Teacher's Position 237 

IV. The Fundamental Character of our Needs . . .239 

Appendix 243 

Index 255 



CHAPTER I 

INTRODUCTION 

This book records a study of the French schools that was 
made for the light it might shed on the teaching of English 
in America. In addition to the reasons that justify com- 
parative studies in classroom methods generally, one other 
holds in this case. The mother tongue is at once a " sub- 
ject " and a part of every other educational activity. Help- 
ing schoolboys and college students to write well is not 
merely a matter of teaching courses; it is a problem that is 
intricately related to our entire educational scheme. We 
shall never make any real progress simply by deciding be- 
tween much reading and little in a given semester, between 
Hawthorne and George Eliot in a certain year in the high 
school, between daily themes and weekly themes, or between 
one style of oral composition and another, important as 
these individual matters may be. Neither shall we find any 
happy solution in the mere addition of one or two assistants 
to the Department of English. We must first go beyond 
all these perplexing details and see the problem in its en- 
tirety. We must understand, moreover, all that should be 
done in order to make the teaching of English effective. 
Then, after we have gained a clear view of the large outlines 
of the problem, and after we have decided upon a general 
method of procedure, we must work out the details in accord- 
ance with our larger view. Nothing of very great conse- 
quence will be brought to pass if our efforts are scattered 
and antagonistic or if we spend all of our spare time in 
trying to say something caustic about what somebody else 



4 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

in our own field has done or has proposed to do. There 
must be greater singleness of direction in our" work. It 
was in the hope that I might help in some small measure 
to bring about a more fruitful organization of effort in 
America that I conceived and carried out the plan of observ- 
ing how pupils learn to write in another country. 

To be sure, we must work out our own American prob- 
lems. We cannot hope to adopt bodily any very large part 
of the system or the methods employed elsewhere. Yet 
when we bear in mind the diversified educational interests 
that the newness of our country has forced upon our atten- 
tion during the past few decades, it need not be any reflec- 
tion on our efforts if we wonder whether an older country 
might not still be able to teach us many things about 
developing a boy's ability to express himself. We may be 
led to see where changes could be made to advantage, even 
though the other country suggest no way of making any 
change; we may see in some instances, perhaps, how the 
change ought to be made; and in a wide variety of instances, 
we are certain to see where our own judgment has been 
corroborated by the practice of teachers who have been 
working quite independently of us and our peculiar needs. 
We cannot fail to go about our work with surer confidence 
if we know how the teachers in another country have gone 
about theirs. 

France affords special advantages for a study of this kind. 
To begin with, the French boy has for a long time borne the 
reputation of being a good writer; and any reasonably 
thorough inquiry into the matter will convince one that the 
reputation is well merited. There may be some who doubt 
whether the French boy writes as well to-day as he did 
twenty or thirty years ago — although I found few French 
educators who believe there has been any noticeable deterio- 



INTRODUCTION 5 

ration among boys of the same native ability and social 
class — yet' according to American standards, he writes 
well. If a great many specimens of written work done in 
different parts of France form a basis for judgment, he 
writes with greater grammatical correctness, sharper accu- 
racy of thought, surer and more intelligent freedom, and 
greater regard for good form and finish, than does the Ameri- 
can boy of the same age. 

Secondly, whatever skill the French boy may possess 
must be attributed in large part to generations of training. 
For two centuries, at least, the French people have placed 
emphasis upon the importance of good speaking and writing. 
It is now almost a century and a half since Rivarol made his 
striking declaration, " That which is not clear is not 
French." With the extension of both the primary and 
secondary schools in the nineteenth century, this ideal 
ceased to be that of the few and became that of the many. 
The old theory, superstitiously accepted in America, that 
through a combination of the French boy's superior intelli- 
gence and some sort of magic in his native language he has 
been able to express himself with an ease and accuracy 
impossible in other tongues, cannot be taken seriously. 
The French boy can scarcely be said to be the superior of 
the American boy in intelligence, and although his mother 
tongue has some well-known advantages, especially in 
matters of brevity and neatness, it has so many shortcom- 
ings that it cannot be regarded as a medium of miraculous 
character. Moreover, the French language is not easily 
learned well, even by the native French mind; and merely 
for purposes of accepted everyday use, it is not mastered 
without much systematic study. It seems, then, more 
reasonable to suppose that the training which enables 
barbers, cobblers, messenger boys, autobus conductors, 



6 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

grocers, and waitresses to explain questions of grammatical 
and rhetorical usage, has also helped to provide them with 
a conscience which in large measure holds them to accurate 
speech and writing. 

If further evidence on this point were required, it 
might easily be found in the progress made by American 
boys who live in France and study English, as well as 
French, in the public schools. In the course of the inves- 
tigation recorded in the following pages, I sought out the 
parents of a large number of these boys and questioned 
them, as well as the boys themselves, concerning the re- 
sults attained. Almost without exception, both the pupils 
and the parents were enthusiastic in their responses. The 
boys had caught some of the French classroom spirit of 
work; and the parents marveled. They explained in some 
instances, as though it were rather a serious reflection on 
the schools, that pupils had to work harder than they did 
in America; but they invariably added that with the in- 
creased work came greater skill in both French and English. 
Their observation of specific cases only corroborates reason 
and the study of large numbers of pupils by schools. No 
one, in truth, who remains in the atmosphere of the French 
classroom for a year or two can continue to believe that 
pupils' ability to write is wholly, or even chiefly, a simple 
matter of predestination. The schools must have their 
due. 

Just now there is another important reason why a study 
of this kind in France ought to be profitable to us in 
America. This reason grows out of the new political and 
educational life of the French people since 1870. Since 
this period of the Franco-Prussian War, there has been an 
inclination in our own country to look upon France as a 
nation whose achievements belong wholly in the past. 



INTRODUCTION 7 

This attitude I encountered several years ago when I first 
informed some friends that I hoped to spend a year in the 
French schools studying certain educational problems. 
They expressed surprise that one should look upon France 
as having anything to contribute to present-day life. And 
their attitude represents a widespread misapprehension 
among a part of the American people. They regard the 
France of to-day as a nation made up chiefly of milliners, 
ladies' tailors, long-haired artists, and " decadent," ab- 
sinthe-drinking poets who live a life of sensuous ease, 
glorying in the nation's past and forgetting its present and 
its future. Quite naturally they ask what we intense, 
matter-of-fact Americans can learn from such a people. 
This view, unfortunately, disregards many of the French- 
man's most characteristic qualities, his most firmly fixed 
ideals, and above all, his tremendous progress in the last 
forty years. Smarting under the humiliation of defeat at 
arms, he has been busily engaged in regenerating his nation 
in many important respects. The immediate presence of 
such a powerful enemy as the German Empire has served 
as a stimulus to the closest industry. 1 And while we have 
been shouting from the housetops about our bigness, our 
liberty, the magnificence of our university "plants," the 
glory of our schools, and the size of our educational meet- 
ings, France has been very diligently, very modestly work- 
ing out many of the problems that in America remain largely 
unsolved and in some instances almost untouched. 

The present, therefore, is an opportune time for such 
a study. The changes that have been taking place in 
France have resulted in a more effective scheme of educa- 
tion, and they cannot be said to have destroyed anything 

1 This Introduction, as well as most of the later chapters, was written 
before the outbreak of the present European war. 



8 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

that the spirit of the times would justify keeping. There 
has been no " breaking down " of French culture, as we are 
occasionally asked to believe, but only a well-considered, 
logical effort to adapt culture to the conditions that have 
arisen in France, as elsewhere, because of new economic and 
social demands. 

Just now we are in a position to see, then, what the French 
have discarded as faulty or relatively unessential, what 
they are still doubtful about, and what has met with their 
approval so thoroughly that they have held to it firmly, even 
though it be old. If it appears that I dwell chiefly upon 
things that merit approval, rather than upon the doubtful 
or the faulty, it need only be borne in mind that my chief 
aim is to point out what seems to contribute to successful 
teaching. Weaknesses, even absurdities, have existed and 
still exist in French education; but in the present study, 
most of these would be irrelevant. 

One word of caution: We should not be misguided into 
believing that French educational affairs are in a chaotic 
state simply because French educators sometimes cry out 
against one another and one another's methods. In the 
first place, no organization as large as a nation's body of 
teachers can be free from disagreement if the members are 
inquiring and conscientious. This we may see by look- 
ing at ourselves. Any unprejudiced foreigner who might 
chance to read the American newspapers received at any 
European capital during the Christmas holidays would be 
convinced by the accounts of our numerous educational 
meetings that it would be impossible for us to continue our 
work of training the youth of the land unless many violent 
reforms were made immediately in almost every part of our 
educational system. Yet after the holidays, our schools 
go on, as we all know, very much as they did before the 



INTRODUCTION 9 

meetings. There must always be some of this diversity of 
opinion on matters of importance; and so in France. In 
the second place, the French teachers are sincerely very 
modest about their attainments, and often think some one 
else must be able to do a given task better than they can, 
simply because they themselves see how far their own work 
falls short of perfection. Again, because the Frenchman 
enjoys exercising his ability to reason clearly and sharply, 
he is sometimes led to discuss, with much spirit, questions 
that are of relatively little moment. As a matter of 
fact, many of the heated arguments on educational ques- 
tions in France to-day are due chiefly to one quality of the 
French character: the Frenchman has the ability — more 
than any other European, I believe — to stand off and look 
at himself as others see him. He can take the point of view 
of other people and criticise himself in order that he may 
improve in some particular respect. Thus it comes about 
that just now the Frenchman is looking at himself from the 
point of view of the Englishman, and is encouraging out- 
door sports among the school pupils. He is, despite the 
influence of long, firmly-established traditions, reasonably 
open-minded — at least in educational matters; and he 
stands ready to learn not only by the observation of other 
people, but by the analysis of his own experience. I have 
sometimes thought him less charitable toward himself and 
his fellow countrymen than toward the people of any other 
nation. 

In the chapters that follow, the chief aim is to show how 
the educational system that has reached its highest perfec- 
tion under the quickened French life of the past half- 
century serves as a powerful means of fortifying the language 
tradition that was fostered in a smaller way in the earlier 
schools. It is not the purpose of the book to give an his- 



io HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

torical view of the teaching of the mother tongue, but 
rather to point out how the accumulated experience of 
French educators is applied to-day. Accordingly, the chap- 
ters consider (i) the full outline of the course of study in 
composition, grammar, and literature; (2) the carrying out 
of the different parts of this course in the classroom; (3) the 
influence of the teaching of foreign languages on the pupil's 
skill in using his native tongue; (4) the French boy's 
teacher; and (5) the results of the methods employed in 
perpetuating good speech and writing, and the possibility of 
attaining some of these results in America. 

I have striven for the larger kind of accuracy and truth. 
It is not possible, I am aware, to generalize with certainty 
on most wide subjects; but in this instance much of the 
difficulty is removed by the fact that the French educa- 
tional system is closely organized. Whatever faults it may 
have, it has at least the merit of sending the entire country 
in the same educational direction. Generalizations are, 
therefore, a little less hazardous. Of course, some parts of 
the book are impression; they profess to be nothing more, 
and need not be accepted if the reader believes the facts 
presented justify other conclusions. I have made no effort 
to reduce everything to documentary evidence and tables 
of statistics. Instead of giving merely the framework of 
programmes and courses, with occasional comment, I have 
sought to reveal the everyday practice of teachers — the 
practice that, after all, shapes the pupil's habits of mind — 
and to suggest the point of view, the moving spirit, of the 
nation's educational life. 



CHAPTER II 

THE COURSES OF STUDY IN THE MOTHER 

TONGUE 

I. THE BEARING OF THE EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM 

In order to understand the following programmes of study, 
it is necessary to keep in mind two distinct characteristics 
of the French educational system. 1 The first of these is the 
close, highly centralized organization. All educational 
affairs are under the direction of one office, which is pre- 
sided over by the Minister of Public Instruction. The 
Minister is a regular member of the national cabinet, and is, 
therefore, not likely to continue in office for a long period; 
but the directeurs who have charge of the different grades of 
education 2 — and they, it must be said, really carry on the 
work of the office — usually hold their positions for a long 
period of years. The important divisions of the country 
for carrying on educational administration are the acad- 
emies, areas usually larger than our largest counties but 
scarcely so large as our Far- Western congressional districts. 
Of these there are sixteen 3 in all, and each is presided over 
by a recteur, who is at once the head of the university in the 

1 One can gain a fairly good notion of French educational organization 
simply by leafing through the Annuaire de V Instruction publique referred to 
in the Appendix. For an exhaustive treatment of the subject, see Professor 
F. E. Farrington's French Secondary Schools and his The Public Primary 
School System of France, also listed in the Appendix. For a brief historical 
view, see Chapter VII of Monsieur A. L. Guerard's French Civilization in the 
Nineteenth Century (The Century Company) . 

2 Directeur de PEnseignement superieur; Directeur de l'Enseignement 
secondaire; Directeur de l'Enseignement primaire. 

3 Seventeen when one counts Algeria. 



12 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

academic and the general superintendent of all the lower 
schools. Under him are a number of inspectors who devote 
their time to visiting schools, reporting upon the conditions 
they find, and making recommendations for promotions. 
And finally, under the inspectors are the rank and file of the 
teachers. Now the Minister, assisted by his directeurs 
and surrounded by a great body of educational and legal 
advisers, keeps in close and constant touch with the recteur 
in each of the different academies; and the recteur in turn, 
through his academie inspectors and special inspectors for 
lower primary schools, reaches every school within his juris- 
diction. Moreover, in order that the same general stand- 
ards may be maintained throughout the country, a number 
of inspectors-general, the direct representatives of the 
Minister's office in Paris, travel about in the different 
academies and report on conditions as they see them in the 
large. Such an educational scheme, profitable as a field of 
study for anyone who is interested in questions of school 
administration, is significant for us because it gives the 
teaching of the mother tongue a close unity. One can study 
the programmes and know that they represent the whole 
country; and one can easily understand why a given pro- 
gramme is so perfectly organized. 

The second distinct characteristic of the school system is 
the dual organization of all instruction below the university. 
Instead of an elementary school with a high school built 
upon it, as we have in America, the French have two dis- 
tinct systems running parallel from the lowest grades to the 
end of the school courses. It is true that they call one of 
these primaire and the other secondaire, but the terms are 
used in a sense altogether different from our primary and 
secondary and should not be confused with them. Roughly 
speaking, the French secondary instruction, though inevi- 



THE COURSES OF STUDY 13 

tably changing somewhat in its character, corresponds to 
our so-called liberal culture training in America. The boys 
who study in the secondary schools are those who want as 
well-rounded an education as they can get before becoming 
candidates for the bachelor's degree, or they wish to prepare 
for more advanced study in one of the faculties of the uni- 
versity. The primary instruction, on the other hand, is 
intensely practical in character, corresponding in the upper 
grades to the work in our vocational or manual training high 
schools. The boys who pursue their studies in the primary 
system are ordinarily those who wish or need to be able to 
earn a livelihood as soon as possible, or who desire to prepare 
themselves for the higher schools of arts and trades or for 
one of the primary normal schools. Quite naturally, there 
is a socia l division as well. In fact, it would be scarcely too 
much to say that the essential distinction is social. The 
son of the lawyer, or physician, or university professor, or 
well-to-do business man, is likely to approach school train- 
ing in a spirit of greater deliberation than is the son of a 
drayman or plasterer, and he may want to acquire knowl- 
edge of subjects that would not be of any great utilitarian 
benefit. He goes, therefore, to the secondary school, the 
lycee. The son of the blacksmith, the carpenter, the gar- 
dener, or the shopkeeper has not the money to pay the 
small tuition fee charged in the secondary school, he per- 
haps will be required to go to work as soon as he has ful- 
filled the requirements of the law at the age of thirteen, — 
the end of the middle division of the primary course, — and 
his interests, growing out of the interests of his family, are 
mostly utilitarian. He goes, therefore, to the primary 
school. It is true that the course in the secondary school 
system makes provision for the transfer of boys from the 
primary system at the age of nine or ten; yet a very small 



14 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

number make the change. The practical difficulties of going 
to a secondary school are frequently too great, and then 
there is, I found in talking with pupils, a mild disdain for 
pupils who are being educated in the other system, which- 
ever it happens to be. As a result, the division is rather 
sharply drawn, and it modifies, we shall see, the course in 
the mother tongue. 

II. THE PROGRAMMES 

The programmes should be studied carefully. They have 
been worked out in such detail, and they are followed by 
teachers with such fidelity, that they constitute a real begin- 
ning for the study of classroom practice. Perhaps a few 
observations will make them more immediately clear. The 
programmes for secondary schools were adopted in 1902 and 
became effective the following year. Before that time 
there was a pronounced feeling that the secondary schools 
were not meeting the educational needs of the day. An 
attempt was made, therefore, to readjust the programmes 
in the various subjects, and to find a proper balance between 
Classical and " modern " education. All recitation periods, 
too, were fixed at one hour, instead of one and two. In the 
readjustment, the work in the mother tongue was newly 
emphasized and the course was more definitely fixed than 
it had been under the older programmes. The present 
primary school programmes were adopted in 1887, modified 
in 1890, in 1894, in 1897, m 1898, and again in 1909. 

It should be borne in mind that the course in the 
secondary system, that is, in the lycee, though no longer 
when measured in years than the American course through 
the high school, is long enough, in days and hours and the 
work actually done, to carry a student almost to the end of 
his sophomore year in an American college. During the 



THE COURSES OF STUDY 15 

last year, since the student devotes his time to a special 
course in either philosophy or mathematics, he receives no 
systematic training in the mother tongue, In the primary 
course of study, which may be regarded roughly as a year 
shorter than the secondary course, the student receives 
systematic training up to the very end of the last year. It 
may be said, then, that the French boy has regular instruc- 
tion in his own tongue from the day he enters school till the 
end of a period corresponding to the freshman year in our 
colleges. Of course, if he then goes to any of the higher 
special schools or to the university, he is almost certain to 
have a great deal more than this ; but this much at least he 
is sure to have. 

It should be observed, too, that the instruction in the 
mother tongue, even to the end of both the primary and 
secondary courses, includes not only literature, but gram- 
mar and composition. In other words, the mother tongue 
is treated as one subject made up of different parts — as it ^ 
always should be treated — and not as two or three or four- 
different subjects. This does not mean that one part of the 
subject is regarded as being just as important as another, or 
that one part should receive the same relative consideration 
throughout the course. As a matter of fact, one of the 
striking features of the programmes is the skillful manner 
in which some divisions of the subject are made to increase 
steadily in importance up through the school course while 
others just as gradually decrease. But there is no com- 
plete putting aside of grammar for composition, or com- 
position for literature, simply because some teacher or group 
of teachers may prefer composition to grammar, or litera- 
ture to composition. 

The unity of the course is revealed also in the close con- 
tinuity of the work from year to year. If the pupil remains 



1 6 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

in one school system, or changes from one to the other early 
in his school career, there is no break in methods or ideals as 
there often is with us when a pupil enters high school, or as 
there is certain to be when he leaves high school and enters 
college. Continuity is looked upon as being so essential to 
the most effective work, that teachers of the different grades 
in a lycee are required to meet regularly and discuss what 
they are doing, so that there will be no untouched topics, no 
unbridged chasms, and, on the other hand, no needless over- 
lapping. In this manner every teacher of the mother tongue 
knows with reasonable definiteness what a boy has accom- 
plished before he enters a given class and what will be ex- 
pected of him after he goes from it to the next one above. 
And all the teachers, through this close knowledge and 
through discussions of the exercises, compositions, and 
readings suitable to the different grades, are enabled with- 
out sacrificing their individuality to give common direction 
to their work. 

In reading the programmes, one should not fail to note 
that the system of numbering the grades in the secondary 
course is different from that employed in American schools. 
Thus Class Seven does not mean the seventh class from the 
beginning as in our grades, but the seventh class from the 
end; and Class One does not refer to a beginning class, but 
to the last class (save the special year of mathematics or 
philosophy). 

From the beginning of Class Six to the end of Class 
Three, the secondary course is in two divisions. Division 
A centers about the Classics, and Division B about the 
modern languages. From the beginning of Class Two to 
the end of the programme, the course is in four divisions : 
A (Latin-Greek), B (Latin-Modern Languages), C (Latin- 
Science), and D (Science-Modern Languages). The study 



THE COURSES OF STUDY 17 

of the mother tongue is essentially the same in the different 
divisions. 

In translating the programmes of study I have included 
all footnotes that accompanied the original text. Any 
notes that I have added are enclosed in brackets. In order 
to render comparison less difficult, I have made the sub- 
headings in the earlier years of the secondary course 
conform in arrangement and type to the corresponding 
subheadings in the primary course. I have also indicated 
the approximate age of pupils in all instances where this 
information was not included in the original. 



18 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

PRIMARY SCHOOL SYSTEM 
THE LOWER PRIMARY SCHOOLS 

Beginning Course 

(From five to seven years of age. Ten hours a week.) 

Reading: First exercises in reading. — Letters, syllables, 
words. 

Penmanship: First elements. 

French language: Combined exercises in language, reading, 
and penmanship, preparing the way to orthography. 

(i) Oral exercises: 

Very familiar questions designed to lead the pupils to 
express themselves clearly; the correction of faults of pro- 
nunciation or local accents. 

(2) Memory exercises : 

Recitation of very short bits of poetry. 

(3) Written exercises : 

Beginning dictations, first of one word at a time, then of 
two or three, and then of very short sentences. 

(4) Very simple readings by the teacher, which are to be 
listened to and retold by the pupils. 



THE COURSES OF STUDY 19 

SECONDARY SCHOOL SYSTEM 

BEGINNING CLASSES 
(Age of pupils, five to seven years. Ten hours a week.) 
Reading: First lessons. 

Penmanship: Methodical, progressive exercises. 
French language: 

(1) Oral exercises: 

Questions about very familiar matters, designed to lead 
the pupils to express themselves clearly. The correction 
of faults in pronunciation. 

Very simple exercises in the language: vocabulary and 
short sentences. 

The recitation from memory of poems that are very simple 
and very easy to understand, and that have been explained 
in advance. 

(2) Written exercises: 

First, the copying of short texts previously explained, 
thus preparing the way for the study of orthography. 
The writing of some texts of the same kind from dictation. 

(3) The reading aloud of short pieces before the class and 
the retelling of them by the pupils. 

PREPARATORY CLASSES 

First Year Preparatory, or Tenth Class 

(Age of pupils, seven or eight. Nine hours a week.) 
Reading: Reading regularly, accompanied by brief explana- 
tions of the meanings of the most difficult words. 

Elementary book of selections : from various authors. 
Penmanship: Systematic, progressive exercises. 
French language: First notions about the different parts of 
speech: noun, article, adjective, and verb. 

1 The use of a book of selections is obligatory in the preparatory and ele- 
mentary classes. 



20 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 
Primary Programme (continued). 

Elementary Course 

(From seven to nine years of age. Ten hours a week.) 
Reading: Reading regularly, with explanations of words. 

Penmanship: Writing in large, medium-sized, and small 
characters. 

French language: First notions, given orally, of the noun 
(number and gender), adjective, pronoun, and verb (the first 
elements of conjugation). 

The formation of the plural and the feminine; the agree- 
ment of the adjective with its noun, and of the verb with its 
subject. 

Idea of the simple proposition. 

(i) Oral exercises: 

Questions and explanations, especially in the course of the 
reading lesson or in the correction of exercises. Interroga- 
tions on the meaning, the use, and the orthography of the 
words used in the text read. — Spelling of difficult words. 
Oral reproduction of short sentences read and explained, 
then of stories or parts of stories told by the teacher. 

(2) Memory exercises: 

Recitation of poems of a very simple kind. 

(3) Written exercises: 

Graded dictations in spelling and orthography. 
Short grammatical exercises of a great variety of forms. 
Some dictations relative to alcoholism, its ugliness, and 
its dangers. 



THE COURSES OF STUDY 21 

Secondary Programme (continued). 

First elements of conjugation. — Eire [to be]. Avoir [to 
have]. — Regular verbs (active voice). 

Formation of the feminine and the plural. 

Agreement of the adjective with the noun, of the verb 
with its subject. 

Analysis * reduced to its simplest form. 

Nature of words : gender and number. 

Agreement of the adjective with the noun that it limits 
or qualifies. 

Subject of the verb. 

Exercises in analysis, usually oral, but sometimes written. 

(1) Oral exercises: 

Questions and explanations growing out of the different 
kinds of classroom work, especially the reading lesson or 
the correction of written exercises. 

Questions on the meaning, use, and orthography of words 
in the text read. The spelling of difficult words. 

The oral reproduction of short sentences previously read 
and explained, and later, of stories or parts of stories told by 
the teacher. 

(2) Memory exercises. 

Recitation of poetry of a very simple kind, always ex- 
plained in class in advance (meanings of the words and 
sentences) . 

(3) Written exercises: 

Graduated exercises in spelling (on the blackboard or 
in the exercise-book). 

Short dictations of pieces previously read and explained, 
each piece to be complete in itself and interesting. 

The pupil's attention is to be directed to punctuation. 

1 [The French analyse is usually a combination of sentence analysis and a 
very simple kind of parsing.] 



22 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

Primary Programme (continued). 

Written reproduction (on the blackboard or in the exer- 
cise-book) of some sentences that have previously been 
explained. 

Composition of short sentences from elements given by 
the teacher. 

(4) Exercises in analysis: 

Grammatical analysis (usually oral, sometimes written). 
Separation of the proposition into its essential terms. 

(5) Reading aloud by the teacher, twice a week, of selec- 
tions designed to interest the pupils. 



THE COURSES OF STUDY 23 

Secondary Programme (continued). 

Second Year Preparatory, or Ninth Class 

(Age of pupils, eight or nine. Seven hours a week.) 

Reading: The same programme as in the preceding year. 
Elementary book of selections * from various authors. 

Penmanship: The same programme as in the preceding 
year. 

French language: Ideas on the different parts of speech: 
noun, article, adjective, pronoun, verb, and adverb. 

The simplest rules of agreement. 

Analysis reduced to its simplest form. 

Nature of words: gender, number, person, tense, and 
mood. 

Idea of the simple proposition; analysis of its essential 
elements, — subject, verb, and complement of the verb 
(direct or indirect). 

Attribute of the subject. 

Exercises in analysis, usually oral, but sometimes written. 

(1) Oral exercises: 

The same programme as in the preceding year. 

(2) Memory exercises: 

The same programme as in the preceding year. The 
teacher may assign pieces that have been dictated after 
having been read and explained in class. 

(3) Written exercises : 

The same programme as in the preceding year. 
Short exercises on the French language. 
Composition of short sentences from given elements. 

1 The use of a book of selections is obligatory in the preparatory and ele- 
mentary classes. 



24 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 
Primary Programme (continued). 

Middle Course 

(From nine to eleven years of age. Ten hours a week.) 

Reading: Reading regularly, with explanations. 

Penmanship: The ordinary running hand. 

French language: Elementary grammar. — The parts of 
speech. — Conjugations. — Notions of syntax. 

General rules of the past participle. Notions of the 
f amilies of words : derived words and compound words. — 
Principles of punctuation. 

(i) Oral exercises: 
Elocution and pronunciation. 
Interrogations on grammatical subjects. 
Reproduction of stories told by the teacher; summaries 
of selections read in class. 

(2) Memory exercises: 

Recitation of fables, of short poems, and of some selec- 
tions in prose. 

(3) Written exercises: 

Dictations chosen, as far as possible, from classic authors, 
and without pursuit of grammatical difficulties. 

Exercises in invention and in the construction of sen- 
tences; homonyms, synonyms. 

Correction by the pupils of one another's dictations and 
exercises. 

Reproduction in the pupils' own words of selections read 
in class or at home, and of stories told by the teacher. 



THE COURSES OF STUDY 25 

Secondary Programme (continued). 

Note: The teacher may, according to circumstances, 
adopt suggestions from the programme for the next higher 

class. 1 

ELEMENTARY CLASSES 

Eighth Class 

(Age of pupils, nine or ten. Seven hours a week.) 

Reading: Reading regularly, accompanied by brief explana- 
tions of the meanings of the most difficult words. 

Elementary book of selections 2 from various authors. 

Reading with explanation, either of a piece to be com- 
mitted to memory, or of a dictation given as an exercise, or 
of a passage chosen from the book of selections. 

Penmanship: Running hand, vertical, or English style. 

French language: Elementary grammar. 

Study of the parts of speech. 

Complete conjugation of the regular verbs (active, pas- 
sive, and reflexive voices). 

The most common irregular verbs. 

The most simple notions of syntax. 

Principles of punctuation. 

1 Here are some examples of exercises, which, of course, it will be neces- 
sary to vary: 

Distinguish the nouns, adjectives, verbs, etc., used in sentences which the 
teacher writes on the blackboard or asks the pupil to read from the textbook. 
Change the tenses of the verbs in a story; change the person. The pupils 
should be drilled in finding and, if possible, in classifying a number of 
nouns, adjectives, and verbs which relate to a given order of ideas. Require 
the opposites of given adjectives; the same exercise on the abstract nouns 
which correspond to the adjectives. 

These exercises are well suited to the Ninth Class, Eighth, or Seventh. 

2 The use of a book of selections is obligatory in the preparatory and ele- 
mentary classes. 



26 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

Primary Programme (continued). 

First exercises in drawing up material on subjects that 
are very simple and best known to the pupils. Choose 
sometimes for a subject the consequences of alcoholism. 

(4) Exercises in analysis : 
Grammatical analysis, chiefly oral. 

Logical analysis, limited to fundamental distinctions. 

(5) Reading aloud by the teacher, twice a week, of selec- 
tions taken from classic authors. 



THE COURSES OF STUDY 27 

Secondary Programme (continued). 

Analysis: More complete study of the proposition; func- 
tions of words; subject, verb, complements of place and 
time; attribute of the subject; determinative complement. 

Exercises in analysis, usually oral, but sometimes written. 

(1) Oral exercises: 

Reproduction of stories told by the teacher, and sum- 
maries of pieces read in class. 

(2) Memory exercises: 

Recitation of fables, simple pieces of poetry, and occa- 
sional pieces of prose. 

The teacher may assign pieces that have been dictated in 
class. 

(3) Written exercises: 

Graduated exercises in spelling (on the blackboard or in 
the exercise-book). 

Short dictations of pieces previously read and explained, 
each piece to be complete in itself and interesting. 

Varied exercises on the French language. 1 

Short exercises in French composition, consisting of de- 
scriptions of familiar objects and living things that have 
been seen by the pupils, of reproductions of stories studied 
in class, and of narratives based on pictures. 

Seventh Class 

(Age of pupils, ten to eleven. Seven hours a week.) 

Reading: The same programme as in the preceding year. 

Elementary book of selections 2 from various authors. 
Penmanship: The same programme as in the preceding 
year. 

1 See the suggested exercises for the preceding year. 

2 The use of a book of selections is obligatory in the preparatory and ele- 
mentary classes. 



28 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 
Primary Programme (continued). 

Superior Course 

(From eleven to thirteen years of age. Ten hours a week, approximately.) 

Reading: Expressive reading. 

Penmanship: Running hand, oval, or " modified." 

French language: Review of grammar and syntax. Study 
of the proposition and the different kinds of propositions. 

Functions of words in the sentence. 

Principal rules relative to the use of words and the 
sequence of tenses. 

Difficulties presented by the orthography of certain 
nouns, pronouns, adjectives, and irregular verbs. 

Notions of ordinary etymology and of derivations. 

(i) Oral exercises: 

Continuation and development of the exercises in elocu- 
tion. 

Accounts of readings, lessons, walks, experiences, etc. 

Exposition by the pupil of historical or literary selections 
that he has been asked to read and analyze. 

(2) Memory exercises : 

Expressive recitation of selections in prose and in verse, 
of dialogues, and of scenes, all of which are to be drawn from 
the [French] classics. 

(3) Written exercises : 

Dictations chosen from classic authors and without the 
pursuit of grammatical problems. 

Exercises on the derivation and the compounding of 
words, on etymology, and on the application of the most 
important rules of syntax. 



THE COURSES OF STUDY 29 

Secondary Programme (continued). 

French language: Elementary grammar. — Review. 

More complete study of irregular verbs. 

The simplest rules of syntax. 

Ideas on the use of tenses and moods. 

Principles of punctuation. 

Analysis : Complete study of the elements of the proposi- 
tion. 

Attribute of the subject and of the complement. 

Principal kinds of propositions; the relations that may 
exist between them. 

Exercises, usually oral, but sometimes written. 

(1) Oral exercises: 

The same programme as in the preceding year. 

(2) Memory exercises: 

The same programme as in the preceding year. The 
teacher may assign pieces that have been dictated after 
having been read and explained in class. 

(3) Written exercises: 

Graduated exercises in spelling (on the blackboard or in 
the exercise-book) . 

Short dictations of pieces previously read and explained, 
each piece to be complete in itself and interesting. (Avoid 
too many grammatical difficulties.) 

Various exercises on the French language (same pro- 
gramme as in the preceding year). 1 

Short exercises in composition (same programme as in the 
preceding year). 

Very simple letters based on everyday life. 

1 See the suggested exercises for the Ninth Class. 



30 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 
Primary Programme (continued). 

Compositions on simple subjects; sometimes a subject on 
the dangers and the effects of alcoholism. — Accounts of 
lessons and readings. 

(4) Exercises in analysis: 

Questions of grammatical analysis growing out of diffi- 
cult cases encountered in reading. 
Oral exercises in logical analysis. 

(5) Readings by the teacher, with the concourse of the 
pupils: literary, dramatic, and historical subjects. 



THE COURSES OF STUDY 31 

Secondary Programme (continued). 

FIRST CYCLE 

Duration: Four Years 

division b 
Sixth Class 

(Age of pupils, eleven or twelve. Five hours a week.) 1 

Grammar of present-day usage. 

Simple exercises in grammatical and logical analysis, 
chiefly oral. 

Exercises on the vocabulary: families of words, simple 
words, derivatives, and compound words. 

Reading and explanation of authors. 

Recitation. — The pieces to be committed to memory 
are by preference to be poetry. 

Free reproduction, oral or written, of classroom readings 
and memory recitations. 

Short exercises in composition. 

The rules are to be taught above all by usage. The 
teacher will not miss any opportunity to make clear to the 
pupils that they apply these rules instinctively. He will, 
then, constantly bring his teaching into relation with 
examples provided by the written or spoken language. The 
study of grammar will have for its object the summing up 
of the rules drawn from actual experience. 

1 [In Division A, which includes Latin and may include Greek, only three 
hours are devoted to the mother tongue in the first, second, and third years 
of this cycle, and four hours in the fourth. The programme in Division B 
gives a slightly more complete outline of the course than that in Division 
A.1 



32 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 
Primary Programme (continued). 

THE HIGHER PRIMARY SCHOOLS 

First Year 

(Fourteen years of age. Five hours a week.) 

I. Reading and Recitation 

(Three hours a week.) 

Under this title are included exercises of two sorts. Those 
of the first class, dealing with the short selections and in- 
sisting on detail, are designed first of all to accustom the 
pupil to give an exact account of what he reads and to form 
his diction. The others, dealing with longer selections or 
entire works, aim above all to give him a taste for reading. 

(i) Explanation of texts; reading with emphasis and 
expression. 

This exercise, repeated in each class, will have for its 
material either a collection of short pieces complete in 
themselves or of other passages of real literary value, chosen 
from one of the books which the pupils have already read 
and concerning which the teacher will have talked to them. 
The teacher will lead the pupils to disengage the essential 
idea of the passage; to discover the precise meaning of the 
words and to appreciate their appropriateness; to feel, in 
the measure possible, the character and the beauty of the 
selection. One will not neglect to make explanation of how 
the fragment studied fits into the plan of the complete 
work from which it has been taken, nor, on occasion, to 
give some condensed information about the life and work 
of the author. 

The passages to be committed to memory will always be 
chosen from among the selections thus explained. 



THE COURSES OF STUDY 33 

Secondary Programme (continued). 
Authors 1 

(Reading, Explanation, Recitation.) 

Selections in prose and in verse from the French classics. 
(The same book of selections may be used throughout the 
First Cycle.) 

La Fontaine : Fables (the first six books) . 

Fenelon: Selections from the fables and dialogues. 

Buff on: Selected descriptions. 

Stories that have been taken from the poets and prose 
writers of the Middle Ages and put into modern French. 

Selections from the poets of the nineteenth century. 2 

Stories and other narratives taken from the prose writers 
of the nineteenth century. 2 

Fifth Class 

(Age of pupils, twelve or thirteen. Five hours a week.) 

More complete study of grammatical forms. — Syntax. 

Written and oral exercises on the French language. 

Reading and explanation of authors. 

Recitation. — The pieces to be committed to memory 
are by preference to be poetry. 

The pupils will be led to do home reading, which will be 
checked up in class. 

Easy exercises in composition. 

The rules are to be taught above all by usage. The 
teacher will not miss any opportunity to make clear to the 
pupils that they apply these rules instinctively. He will, 
then, constantly bring his teaching into relation with ex- 

1 Each year the teacher will select from this list the works that are to be 
explained in class. 

2 These two groups will be used again in the higher classes. 



34 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

Primary Programme (continued). 

(2) Longer readings, partly in class, partly in the study- 
room or at home, pursued independently or under the direc- 
tion of the teacher. 

These readings, sometimes purely literary, sometimes 
useful complements to the courses in morals, history, geog- 
raphy, or sciences, will be accompanied to advantage by 
prudent comments designed to bring out particular interests 
or beauties, to stimulate the intellectual curiosity of the 
pupils, to lead them to desire to read the work commented 
upon, and to fix their attention on the essential points. 
These comments may be followed sometimes by questions 
asked after the reading has been done, sometimes by con- 
versation, in which the teacher takes notice of the impres- 
sion that has been produced on the pupils, and aids them in 
becoming more sharply conscious of this impression, even 
going so far as to make for them a simple, brief summary 
of what they have retained. 

The outline below is only a very general guide which 
leaves to the teacher the privilege of choosing for himself 
the readings best suited to his pupils. 

(a) Choice of works or parts of works produced by the 
principal prose writers of the seventeenth, eighteenth, and 
nineteenth centuries. 

(b) Selections from the great French poets. 

(c) Choice of plays or parts of plays from the French 
drama of the seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth 
centuries. 



THE COURSES OF STUDY 35 

Secondary Programme (continued). 

amples provided by the written or spoken language. The 
study of grammar will have for its object the summing up 
of the rules drawn from actual experience. 

Authors 1 

(Reading, Explanation, Recitation.) 

Selections in prose and verse from the French classics. 

Chanson de Roland, put into modern French. 

La Fontaine: Fables (the last six books). 

Boileau: Selection of satires, and episodes from the 
Lutrin. 

Racine: Esther. 

Fenelon: Telemague. 

Selections from the poets of the nineteenth century. 

Stories and other narratives taken from the prose writers 
of the nineteenth century. 

Fourth Class 

(Age of pupils, thirteen or fourteen. Five hours a week.) 

Reading and explanation of authors (prose and verse) 
with recitations based upon the reading. 

In the study of the texts the teacher will give such ele- 
ments of historical grammar as may seem necessary. 
These elements are not to constitute a regular course, and 
they are to be given only for the purpose of rendering more 
intelligible the present usage of the language. 

The pupils will be led to do home reading, which is to be 
checked up in class. 2 

1 Each year the teacher will select from this list the works that are to be 
explained in class. 

2 These home readings may be translations of the principal masterpieces 
of ancient and modern literatures. 



36 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

Primary Programme (continued). 

(d) Readings on the social life of the seventeenth and 
eighteenth centuries, drawn above all from memoirs and 
correspondence. 

(e) Readings on the nineteenth century. Letters. 
Historical memoirs. Recollections of travel, and narra- 
tives of explorations. Selections from scientific works. 

(/) Reading of some masterpieces of foreign literature. 



THE COURSES OF STUDY 37 

Secondary Programme (continued). 

French compositions, and exercises on the French lan- 
guage. 

Authors x 

(Reading, Explanation, Recitation.) 

Selections in prose and verse from the French classics. 
Corneille: Le Cid. 
Moliere: VAvare. 
Racine: Athalie, Les Plaideurs. 
Voltaire: Histoire de Charles XII. 
Michelet: Historical extracts. 

Stories and other narratives taken from the writers of the 
eighteenth century. 

Selections from the poets of the nineteenth century. 

Third Class 

(Age of boys, fourteen or fifteen. Five hours a week.) 

Reading and explanation of authors with recitations 
based on the reading. 

The pupils are to be led to do home reading, which is to be 
checked up in class. 2 

Readings and interrogations designed to acquaint the 
pupil with the great epochs in French literature. 

French compositions. 

Beginning with this class, an outline history of French 
literature is to be placed in the hands of the pupils. 

1 Each year the teacher will select from this list the works that are to be 
explained in class. 

2 These home readings may be translations of the principal masterpieces 
of ancient and modern literatures. 



38 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

Primary Programme (continued). 

II. Grammar, Orthography, Analysis, and Vocabulary 

(One hour a week.) 

The teacher will be careful not to devote entire class 
periods to didactic instructions in grammar, since such 
exercises weary the attention of the pupils and leave little 
trace in their minds. The instruction should be given by 
means of exercises chosen carefully by the teacher to exem- 
plify the application of the rules. 

The point is, in effect, not to make a Course in grammar, 
but to review the principal rules which the pupils have 
already learned in the [lower] primary schools, illuminating 
them — especially in the second year — with some notions 
of historical grammar. The study of the vocabulary, — 
that is to say, of words classified methodically, of their modi- 
fications by the use of affixes, of their grouping into families 
according to their etymology, — will occupy an important 
place. Some exercises in orthography will serve to supple- 
ment the studies in grammar and vocabulary. The teacher 
will not abuse grammatical analysis, which should be 
practiced orally, and he will frequently make oral exercises 
in logical analysis, contenting himself with the simplest 
terminology. These exercises are designed to accustom the 
pupils to distinguish the elements of thought. In all the 
exercises in French, the teacher will devote himself primarily 
to the actual usage of the language and will guard against 
subtleties. 



THE COURSES OF STUDY 39 

Secondary Programme (continued). 
Authors l 

(Reading, Explanation, Recitation.) 

Selections in prose and verse from the French classics. 

Corneille: Horace, Cinna. 

Racine: Britannicus, Iphigenie. 

Moliere: Le Bourgeois gentilhomme, Les Femmes savantes. 

Bossuet: Funeral orations. 

Chateaubriand: Narratives, scenes, and landscapes. 

Victor Hugo: Selected poems. 

Stories and other narratives taken from the writers of the 
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. 

Scenes selected from the comedy writers of the seven- 
teenth and eighteenth centuries. 

SECOND CYCLE 

Duration: Three Years 
(The programme [in the mother tongue] is the same in Sections A, B, and C.) 

Second Class 

(Age of pupils, fifteen or sixteen. Four hours a week.) 

Explanation and recitation of French authors. 

The pupils are to do home reading, which is to be checked 
up in class. 

In the study of the texts, the teacher will give such ele- 
ments of historical grammar as may seem necessary. These 
elements are not to constitute a regular course, and they are 
to be given only for the purpose of rendering more intelligi- 
ble the present usage of the language. 

French compositions. 

1 Each year the teacher will choose from this list the authors that are to be 
explained in class. 



40 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 
Primary Programme (continued). 

III. French Composition 

(One hour a week.) 

Exercises in composition of a very simple kind: defini- 
tions, descriptions, narratives, letters, reports on reading. 

The teacher will not regard composition merely as a 
simple exercise in language, but indeed as one of the prin- 
cipal means of helping the pupil's thought to form itself. If 
reading opens the field of ideas, composition gives exercise 
in choosing, grouping, and expressing them. It is for the 
teacher a means of knowing the mental activity of the pupil, 
and of verifying his mental accuracy. It is important, 
therefore, that the subjects be adapted to the powers of the 
pupils, methodically graded, and often related to the read- 
ings which are to follow or precede the exercise in composi- 
tion. 



THE COURSES OF STUDY 41 

Secondary Programme (continued). 

Readings and interrogations designed to give a knowledge 
of the chief French writers down to the end of the sixteenth 
century. 

Beginning with this class, a more advanced grammar is to 
be placed in the hands of the pupils. 

Authors 1 

Selections from the prose writers and poets of the six- 
teenth, seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth centuries. 

Chanson de Roland. 

Villehardouin, Joinville, Froissart, Commines: Selections. 

A book of selections from Mediaeval literature. 

Montaigne: Principal chapters, and extracts. 

Poetic masterpieces of Marot, Ronsard, du Bellay, d'Au- 
bigne, and Regnier. 

Corneille: Selected plays. 

Moliere: Selected plays. 

Racine: Selected plays. 

La Fontaine: Fables. 

Boileau: Satires and epistles. 

Bossuet: Funeral orations. 

La Bruyere : Caracteres. 

Selected letters of the seventeenth and eighteenth cen- 
turies. 

Readings on the social life of the seventeenth century, 
selected from the memoirs and correspondence of that 
period. 

J.-J. Rousseau: Selections. 

Poetic masterpieces of Lamartine and Victor Hugo. 

A choice from the leading historians of the nineteenth 
century. 

1 Each year the teacher will choose from this list the authors that are to 
be explained in class. 



42 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 
Primary Programme (continued). 

Second and TmRD Years 

(Fifteen, sixteen, or seventeen years of age. Five hours a week.) l 

The programme of the second and third years remains in 
essential respects the same as that of the first year; it com- 
prises reading and composition, to which are to be added 
instruction in grammar, exercises in orthography, and oral 
exercises in logical and grammatical analysis. 

Naturally it will be the duty of the teacher to grade the 
various exercises and to adapt them to the attainments of 
the pupils. 

During these two years, and especially in the third, the 
importance of composition increases, and that of the special 
exercises in orthography diminishes. The composition, on 
the other hand, ought to serve at the same time as an exer- 
cise in orthography; it is important that the teacher impress 
upon the pupil the thought that accuracy is demanded not 
merely in the special compositions, but in every written 
exercise. 

As for the work in composition, its scope should be en- 
larged in keeping with the development of the pupil. The 
teacher can profitably require him to give an account of a 
piece of reading, a journey, or an excursion; the descrip- 
tion of a factory, or of occupations belonging to different 
seasons. He should be required to exercise his powers of 
observation, imagination, and feeling. One should teach 

1 [In the agricultural and commercial sections, four hours; in the indus- 
trial section, three hours.] 



THE COURSES OF STUDY 43 

Secondary Programme (continued). 
First Class 

(Age of pupils, sixteen or seventeen. Four hours a week.) 

Explanation and recitation of French authors. 

The pupils will do home reading, which is to be checked 
up in class. 

French compositions. 

Readings and interrogations designed to give a knowledge 
of the principal French writers from the seventeenth cen- 
tury to the end of the first half of the nineteenth century. 

Authors x 

Selections from the prose writers and poets of the six- 
teenth, seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth centuries. 

Montaigne : Principal chapters and extracts. 

Corneille: Selected plays. 

Moliere: Selected plays. 

Racine: Selected plays. 

La Fontaine: Fables. 

Boileau: Epitres, Satires, Art poetique. — Extracts from 
prose works. 

Pascal: Pensees, Provinciates (I, IV, XIII, and ex- 
tracts). 

Bossuet: Funeral orations. Selected sermons. Ex- 
tracts from miscellaneous works. 

La Bruyere : Caracteres. 

Fenelon: Lettre a V Academic; selections from other 
works. 

Selected letters from the seventeenth and eighteenth 
centuries. 

1 Each year the teacher will select from this list the works that are to be 
explained in class. 



44 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

Primary Programme (concluded). 

him not to content himself with vague expressions, with cut 
and dried phrases, but to seek out the word and the phrase 
which reflect his thought most accurately, and to put into 
his diction as much as possible of his personality. 



THE COURSES OF STUDY 45 

Secondary Programme (concluded). 

Montesquieu : Considerations sur les causes de la grandeur 
des Romains et de leur decadence. — Selections from the 
Esprit des lois and miscellaneous works. 

Buff on: Selections (speeches and general views). 

Voltaire : Selections from his historical writings and other 
prose works. 

Diderot: Selections. 

J. -J. Rousseau: Selections. — Lettres a d'Alembert sur les 
spectacles. 

Readings on the social life of the eighteenth century, 
selected from the memoirs and correspondence of that 
period. 

Poetical masterpieces of Lamartine and Victor Hugo. 

A choice from the moralists of the seventeenth, eight- 
eenth, and nineteenth centuries. 

A choice from the principal historians of the nineteenth 
century. 

Class in Mathematics or Philosophy 

[In this last year of the secondary course there is no 
systematic instruction in the mother tongue.] 



CHAPTER III 

COMPOSITION 
I. THE FRENCH ATTITUDE TOWARD COMPOSITION 

As soon as an American teacher comes into direct contact 
with the French educational system, he marvels at the large 
place writing holds in the schools and their routine life. 
First, it matters not in what classroom a small boy may be 
seen, he is never without his general notebook, in which he 
records all assignments, all problems, all experiments, all 
quotations to be learned, all geographical and historical 
notes and maps, as well as many special exercises; and the 
language he employs in this work is carefully marked and 
graded by the teacher. In the second place, compositions 
are numerous. From the time the boy is regarded as 
mature enough to think consecutively, he prepares composi- 
tions at regular intervals. In some classes he writes two 
short exercises a week; in others, one more formal piece 
each week; and still in others., a longer piece every two 
weeks with shorter exercises every three or five days. In 
the elementary primary schools, even up to the time the 
boy is thirteen or fourteen years old, the shorter themes 
once or twice a week seem to stand in great favor. These 
vary in length, usually, from a hundred and fifty to four 
hundred words — they are rather longer than the average 
American daily theme — and the less frequent, longer com- 
positions range ordinarily from six hundred to fifteen 
hundred words. Then, in the upper grades, there are, in 
addition, many papers in history, civics, philosophy, and 
4 6 



COMPOSITION 47 

literature. So it may be seen that a boy is provided with 
much opportunity to write. It is, in fact, scarcely an 
exaggeration to say that he writes all the time. In any 
event, his practice is so continuous that he sooner or later 
comes to do the work in a perfectly normal frame of mind, 
just as he performs his other schoolday labors. 

The volume of required writing, however, is regarded as 
less important than its quality. If a boy thinks and writes 
poorly, he is looked upon as an unfortunate who deserves 
either pity or contempt. If, on the other hand, he is able to 
think and write skillfully, he is held in great honor by his 
teachers and his classmates. And this interest in ability 
to write is evident outside the recitation-room. Authors 
of books and articles discuss the perils of the pure mother 
tongue as seriously as if they were dealing with a question 
of ethics or of grave national policy. Parents, I found 
when I was securing compositions for the purposes of this 
book, are usually desirous of preserving the written work of 
their children. Moreover, when pupils distinguish them- 
selves in examinations — which in France are always largely 
a matter of composition — they receive prizes and public 
mention very much as if they were the winners of athletic 
trophies. Now I would not have anyone make the hasty 
inference that intellectual contests are substituted for 
athletics. The French boy loves the. open just as much as 
the American boy does, and outdoor sports are steadily 
taking a larger place in school life. But the ideal of writing 
well has been held up before the schoolboy so long, and with 
such seriousness, that he attaches more importance to 
ability of this kind than the average American boy could 
at present be led to comprehend. 

When so much importance is everywhere attached to 
ability to write, it is not surprising to find that in both the 



48 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

primary and secondary school systems the course in the 
mother tongue gives large place to systematic training in 
composition. It is the conviction of the great body of 
teachers, as well as the Ministry, 1 that work in grammar, 
rhetoric, and literature is in most respects lost unless it 
contributes to the pupil's ability to give full, intelligent 
expression to his thought. Moreover, theories of teaching, 
and all the proposed changes in the course of study, seem to 
be considered first in respect to their influence on this ability 
of the pupil. Expression is not the sole end, but in all the 
lower schools it is the primary end. And, taking the other 
point of view, the chief responsibility for the pupil's manner 
of expression rests upon the teacher of the mother tongue. 
As we shall see later, the writing that the boy does in his- 
tory, geometry, and his other subjects is made to contribute 
its full share to his skill; yet upon the teacher of the native 
language rests the largest responsibility and the greatest 
burden of labor. He accepts his task as difficult, very 
expensive in time and energy, but extremely important. 
Without going into any examination of exceptional aims or 
of intricate personal devices, let us see what he attempts to 
accomplish and how he pursues his way. 

II. PRELIMINARIES TO COMPOSITION 

A. Enlarging and Organizing the Vocabulary 

Two groups of exercises are everywhere regarded as 
essential preliminaries to work in original composition. 
Those in the first group are intended to enlarge and organize 
the pupil's vocabulary. Now, I am aware that when one 
stands apart and looks at exercises designed to improve the 

1 Instructions, p. 64 ff. The page reference here, as in all following 
instances, is to the edition of the Instructions that was in circulation in 
1912-1913. 



COMPOSITION 49 

vocabulary, they are likely to appear very artificial and 
ineffective. And, in truth, they may be. In the hands of 
a poorly trained teacher, or one who lacks the all-important 
teaching instinct, it would be difficult to imagine an exercise 
that could be more dismally futile. But this possibility 
seems to be disregarded by French educators. They are 
ready to admit that the lessons may become valueless, or 
even harmful, when directed by a poor teacher — and what 
exercise may not ? — but they do not spring to the conclusion 
that such lessons should for that reason be cast aside. They 
have taken the good teacher as the norm, and have given 
themselves earnestly to the task of obviating the dangers 
and developing the advantages of a kind of instruction 
which at its best appears to them to have unquestioned 
value. 

The theory upon which this instruction is based is not the 
individual opinion of the occasional teacher; it is accepted 
doctrine throughout the country. In the volume of Instruc- 
tions l issued by the Minister to teachers in the secondary 
school system, it is summarized as follows: " The preceding 
exercises [in grammar] help the pupil to understand his 
native language and to enrich his vocabulary; but for this 
latter purpose, one ought not to rely solely upon them or 
even upon conversation, dictations, reading, or the explica- 
tion of texts. The pupil must learn words, though never 
apart from things; he must be able to seize their significa- 
tion and the exact shade of their meaning; and he must 
become accustomed to finding the words quickly when he 
stands in need. Hence the value of exercises devoted 
especially to the study of the vocabulary." 

The teaching of the vocabulary I found, then, falls readily 
into three parts: (i) enlarging; (2) sharpening; (3) 

1 Page 75- 



50 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

quickening. To be sure, the instruction is not divided into 
three separate processes, but the teacher has a threefold 
aim that determines his method. One will not see every 
aspect of the method in one recitation or in several. Yet 
the principles emphasized in the Instructions to secondary 
teachers, in textbooks for primary schools, in classes in the 
mother tongue in both school systems, and even in many 
classes in English, serve to give outline to the varying 
details of the work. 

In the exercises designed to enlarge the vocabulary, it 
is held to be absolutely essential that the pupil relate the 
word unmistakably to the object or idea which it represents. 
Although it is much more difficult to have a word in mind 
without relating it to some idea than we generally suppose, 
the French teacher seems to take no risk. He guides the 
pupil to feel the uselessness of words unless they are sym- 
bols of something physically or mentally real. Secondly, 
the pupil is required to relate a new word to other words 
already in his working vocabulary, so that it will remain 
firmly fixed in his mind. The new word may be linked 
to a synonym that is known to the pupil, it may be con- 
trasted with words already known to him, or it simply 
may be linked to a group of ideas that by circumstances are 
brought to his mind frequently; but in some manner he is 
led to associate it with words which he knows well. Thirdly, 
the word is put into normal contexts — sometimes before 
its meanings are explained — so that the pupil may develop 
a feeling for its idiomatic use. And finally, in the definition 
or explanation that a word or a group of words may require, 
the beginning is specific rather than general, concrete rather 
than abstract. In theory at least, a teacher would estab- 
lish the meaning of sincere in a boy's mind before he dis- 
cussed the abstract quality, sincerity. He would show the 



COMPOSITION 51 

boy that many things are rich before he explained richness] 
or noble, before he explained nobility. Moreover, if a word 
has many definitions, the simplest one, the one most easily 
understood, the one that would most readily associate itself 
with the boy's stock of concrete ideas and images, is ex- 
plained before those that are predominantly abstract or 
figurative. It is taken for granted that if a word is to be of 
much value to a boy, it must represent an idea clearly estab- 
lished in his mind, and it must have its individual flavor. 

These exercises designed to enlarge the vocabulary are 
exceedingly interesting. The words chosen for a given day 
are close enough to the pupil's life to be stimulating, the 
recitation calls for much activity on the pupil's part, and 
the period is never long enough to become wearisome. In 
these classes the teacher is certainly aided by the Lessons 
in Things l which constitute a part of the programmes of 
study in both the primary and secondary schools. These 
provide an opportunity to discuss in the classroom a great 
many matters of interest that do not fall readily under any 
given subject in the course of study. They might well be 
called Lessons in General Information. Through them a 
boy of eight or nine becomes acquainted with the peasant 
and the wheat he grows; the miner and the ore or coal 
he mines; the different kinds of cloth used in making 
clothes; the miller, his mill, and the flour he makes; the 
vine-grower, his grapes, and the making of wine; the 
different kinds of combustibles; the different kinds of 
metals; the animals in the neighborhood; the more com- 
mon plant life within reach of the school; the different 
kinds of food products that one may see on the market; 

1 Lecons de choses. They include much more than object lessons. For 
the full scope of the Leqons de choses, see Plan d 'etudes et programmes de 
V Enseignement secondaire (the earlier classes), and Plan a" etudes et pro- 
grammes d'enseignement des £coles primaires. 



52 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

and dozens of other objects and related industries that are 
easily understood. All these Lessons in Things, of course, 
have as their chief object the sharpening of the power of 
observation and the paving of the way to natural sciences; 
but they must be a powerful aid in the systematic enlarging 
of a pupil's everyday vocabulary. 

As the pupil advances in his course, the lessons, as might 
be expected, are based less on what he sees and more on 
what he reads. Ordinarily no long list of defined words is 
printed at the end of the lesson, and I did not see any 
teacher preparing a list himself. Frequently he calls atten- 
tion to certain words when he assigns the lesson for the next 
day, but he does not set them apart in any detached manner. 
Writers of textbooks give special thought to the pupil's 
vocabulary when they choose readings, so that the teacher 
may be able to make steady progress without relying 
wholly upon his own resources. Quite logically, the words 
discussed in the Higher lessons are not chiefly the names of 
objects and simple processes, but rather the names of ideas 
and qualities. Not many words are dealt with in one recita- 
tion, but these are treated fully, in order that the exercise 
may not become a string of perfunctory definitions. The 
word is looked at from many different points of view, and 
its meaning and uses are dwelt upon until the pupil must 
perforce feel that he knows it. Sometimes, too, in classes of 
pupils ten or twelve years old, analysis is employed. This 
exercise, however, is always simple, and, so far as I was 
able to observe, it is always oral. The pupil's mind has 
no opportunity to wander or become inactive. 

Let us consider two or three instances of classroom pro- 
cedure. One morning when I went to a primary school the 
teacher began the hour by calling upon a boy to recite 
from memory a poem that had been assigned a few days 



COMPOSITION 53 

before. As the boy recited, the teacher stopped him from 
time to time and called upon other pupils to explain the 
meaning of sentences, to indicate the function of clauses, 
and especially to explain the given use and the general 
meaning of individual words. The pupils were obliged to 
make all answers without referring to the book; that is to 
say, they were required to know the poem so well that they 
could explain merely from hearing, and at once, just what 
a given word meant in a given instance. Sometimes, too, 
the teacher called for other specific meanings of the word, 
and sometimes for other words of similar or opposite mean- 
ing. I could not help feeling that the lesson was rather 
hard on the boy who was required to stand and wait while 
the others explained, but I could see that the preparation 
which the lesson demanded had resulted in an intimate 
acquaintance with every important word in the text. 

In another class the verb associate (associer) appeared in 
the paragraph that constituted the grammar lesson. The 
teacher asked a boy to use the word in as many different 
ways, both grammatically and according to meaning, as he 
could. Then the teacher and the class talked familiarly 
about associates, society, and the various meanings of social. 
The lesson was not a study of derivations in the ordinary 
meaning of the term, and it was not a formal study of syno- 
nyms. It was only a very intelligent attempt on the part 
of the teacher to have the pupils see that many words are 
related both in their origin and in the meanings that are 
attached to them in daily life. There is nothing novel 
in such an exercise; yet no boy could pass through it day 
after day without having his vocabulary rendered more 
serviceable. 

These exercises, it will be noted, sprang directly from 
some given point or points in the lessons in reading and 



54 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

grammar; and probably they are all the more valuable for 
that reason. But in the elementary and middle classes, 
textbooks make provision for work in vocabulary not only 
through the lessons in reading and dictation, but through 
groups of related words that are only complementary to 
the other assignments in the mother tongue. For example, 
here is a typical group printed in one textbook with a short 
reading lesson on the horror of war: Army, officer, soldier, 
military, cannon, gun, shell, bullet, fortress, declaration of 
war, hostilities, invasion, combat, battle, victory, defeat, armis- 
tice, treaty, peace, arbitration, disarmament. National war, 
civil war, offensive war, defensive war. To declare war, to 
invade, to conclude peace, to resort to arbitration. The ques- 
tion may arise as to whether a boy needs these words until 
after the ideas for which they stand have in some very real 
manner touched his life. The French, however, work on 
the theory that words and ideas usually go hand in hand, 
and that a word will often guide a boy to a valuable idea. 

In the exercises designed primarily to sharpen feeling for 
words, one is sure to be impressed with the many means by 
which a word is brought into the pupil's life. He defines it, 
he finds examples of its accepted uses, he learns its original 
significance — its literal meaning when the word is pre- 
dominantly figurative — he compares it with other words of 
similar meaning, and above all, he contrasts it with words 
that are essentially its opposite. It is scarcely too much 
to say that the basis of all word-teaching is contrast rather 
than likeness. If a given word is used chiefly as a noun, 
the teacher does not let the pupil form the notion that 
synonymous adjectives may be attached to it indis- 
criminately, but helps him to learn what adjectives are or 
may be used appropriately with it. If the word is an 
adjective or verb, he shows how it normally takes certain 



COMPOSITION 55 

adverbs, and how others, as soon as they are brought into 
close relation with it, seem awkward and unidiomatic. In 
a similar manner he guides the pupil to see the distinctions 
that usage has established between nouns which in general 
meaning are the same. To take a very simple example, if 
the word stem appeared in a lesson, he would be extremely 
careful to bring out the difference between stem and stalk, 
stem and trunk, and stalk and trunk, so that the pupil would 
never fall into the error of using them as if they were con- 
vertible terms. Through numerous exercises of this kind 
the pupil is made to see that words do not have the same 
value, and that the choosing of them is not merely a 
question of finding approved dictionary definitions when 
occasion arises, but of possessing a word sense. 

Concerning the exercises in calling words to mind quickly, 
little need be said. Their character has already been sug- 
gested. They usually consist of rapid-fire questions about 
the word itself, its use, its likes and opposites, and of oral or 
written practice in composition on subjects likely to call 
words of a given class into use. I. saw no turning of verse 
into prose, but I did see many exercises that required the 
pupils to turn one kind of prose into another. In most in- 
stances the teacher simply read a story or an essay to the 
class and then called upon pupils to repeat it in language of 
their own. After a little practice of this kind, a boy uncon- 
sciously adopts many words that he has well understood but 
has not made a part of his working vocabulary. He does 
not surrender his individuality, as he must do — momen- 
tarily, at least — in writing imitations, yet he is in a state of 
open-mindedness that encourages a definite impression of 
what he reads or hears read. 

The scope of the lessons in vocabulary is wide. By the 
time a boy has reached the age of twelve he not only has had 



56 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

practice in calling simple objects by their right names, but he 
has reached out into the world around him and made ac- 
quaintance with words belonging to a great variety of 
activities. He can speak intelligently about the professions, 
the occupations of workingmen, the farm, social life, politi- 
cal life; he can discuss the more familiar phenomena of the 
atmosphere, the physical qualities of his friends, their moral 
virtues and their moral faults; he can use accurately the 
words that spring from such relations as commerce, war, 
colonization, life in the city or the small village; and he can 
talk or write about such means of communication as rail- 
ways, steamships, street-railways, and the telegraph and 
telephone. This ability he gains not by sporadic or blind 
plunging about, but by means of orderly, systematic study. 
The instruction is not over-rigid or mechanical; one might 
visit classrooms for months without feeling that the in- 
struction was organized in any large way. Yet it is the 
careful organization that makes the wide scope of the work 
possible. The simplicity is not that of isolated, individual 
effort, but of well-designed plan. 

After one has made due allowance for all human imper- 
fections in teachers, and has put aside all over-idealistic 
notions of the possibilities of any method, one must admit 
that this instruction in the vocabulary is well worth all the 
effort that is put into it. The boy has, in the first place, a 
good fund of words which he can employ with accuracy and 
confidence. He can employ them with accuracy because 
he has had practice in making them carry the meaning they 
ought to carry, and he can employ them with confidence 
because he has not relied upon chance in learning their uses, 
but instead has grown into a sound acquaintance with them 
through numerous discussions and much practice under the 
direction of the teacher. This immediate value of the study, 



COMPOSITION 57 

however, is not the greatest. The greatest value lies in the 
slow but certain growth of a word conscience. The feeling 
for words which the pupil develops becomes a permanent 
part of his life. The boy who has had training of this kind 
may still use slangy or worn speech, but he is at least aware 
of what he does. And he will often avoid the colorless 
word not because he simply knows that it should be avoided, 
but because his quickened nature instinctively revolts 
against it. 

B. Dictation 

The second of the preliminary exercises universally em- 
ployed by the French teacher of the mother tongue is 
dictation. In America, dictation seems to have been put 
aside to make way for something new. French teachers, 
however, do not hesitate to use an old-fashioned method 
or device if they believe it is good. Instead, therefore, 
of dropping dictation from the programme of studies, they 
have emphasized it and developed it until it is now a 
very important and thoroughly established part of their 
educational procedure. It is based on the conviction that a 
child can acquire skill before he develops the power of pro- 
found or sustained thought. He has much practice, then, 
in writing the thoughts of others while he is yet too young 
to write his own. Teachers admit that dictation has its 
dangers, but since they regard these as incomparable to its 
possible value, they employ it, just as they employ exercises 
in vocabulary, with the confidence that though they are 
risking small dangers, they are following the direction of a 
larger common sense. 

French teachers usually dwell upon four or five specific 
values of dictation. It gives the pupil much practice in 
the handling of the sentence; it directs his attention to 



58 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

grammatical constructions; it helps him to learn to spell, to 
punctuate, and to capitalize; it enlarges his vocabulary and 
gives him practice in the use of words already known to him; 
and it fills his mind with good standards of speech. To 
these should be added one value that the thoughtful teacher 
must regard as greatest of all; namely, that dictation 
prevents the pupil from separating spoken language and 
writing. One of the objections almost invariably made by 
the young pupil to practice in original composition is that 
writing seems an artificial process quite unlike anything he 
has ever before attempted. In making this objection, he is, 
of course, merely giving expression to the fact that language 
is naturally a matter of speech rather than writing, and the 
additional fact that he has not felt a close relation between 
what he says by word of mouth and what he writes on paper. 
If then, before he begins composition, and later while he is 
practicing it in an elementary manner, he has drill in writing 
down what he hears, the relation between speech and writing 
is much less likely to be weakened. While he is listening 
carefully to his teacher's reading, catching the words in 
their natural thought groups, and putting them down one 
by one in his exercise-book, he is not only learning much 
about the mechanics of composition, but he is saving himself 
from the error of looking upon theme-writing as something 
far removed from normal existence. 

In giving dictations, the teacher exercises great care. 
After the very earliest classes, where the work must of neces- 
sity be simple, he does not give isolated or detached sen- 
tences, but instead, a complete, interesting paragraph. 
Moreover, he always explains the paragraph fully before he 
asks the pupil to write it down. This precaution is regarded 
as so important that a teacher is prohibited from requiring 
a pupil to write down anything that is meaningless or vague. 



COMPOSITION 59 

Again, he reads a paragraph that contains material suited 
to keep the pupil's attention. That is to say, the ideas and 
the words in which they are expressed must be just within 
the pupil's reach. And finally, the teacher guards against 
letting the exercise become monotonous. It is never long — 
usually it is a short, crisp paragraph — the corrections are 
made immediately while interest is warm, and the pupil 
is not asked to rewrite the dictation unless he has been 
exceedingly careless. The ten or fifteen minutes are so full 
of pleasant activity that the time passes quickly, and the 
boy seems never to dream that he is doing something that 
might, under a thoughtless teacher, become a dreary, useless 
punishment. 

The following passage from Daudet is a specimen of the 
material read for dictation to boys of nine years. Perhaps 
it ought to be explained in passing that the short stories of 
Daudet occupy a large place in many of the earlier exercises 
in the mother tongue. In this instance, the teacher read 
the passage and discussed some of the words, then dictated 
it sentence by sentence. When he had finished, several 
boys read what they had written, one boy spelled all the 
more difficult words, and then all of them underscored 
certain words that were to form the basis of a lesson in 
grammar the following day. The passage: 

Ah, Monsieur Seguin's little goat, how pretty she was! How 
pretty she was with her soft eyes, her beard like a corporal's, her shiny 
black hoofs, her horns striped like a zebra, and her long, white hair 
which formed a kind of greatcoat. . . . Behind his house Monsieur 
Seguin had an enclosure surrounded by hawthorns. There he put his 
new boarder. He fastened her to a stake in the place where the grass 
was best, taking care to give her plenty of rope; and from time to 
time he went to see if she was getting along all right. The little goat 
was very happy and ate the grass with such an appetite that Monsieur 
Seguin was delighted. 1 

1 Translated from Le Chevre de Monsieur Seguin, 



60 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

The French boy of ten or twelve has developed sharp 
hearing and quick writing to such a degree that he can take 
a dictation of this kind with surprising accuracy. I often 
made tests of his ability to write English. One day, for 
example, when I went to a classroom to hear a recitation, 
I asked the teacher if I might give a dictation. The boys 
in the class were eleven and twelve years of age, and they 
were approaching the end of their second year in English 
study. The anecdote which I selected was, I found by 
making inquiry, entirely new to them. It follows: 

When General Washington was President of the United States, he 
had a secretary who was directed to come to him at a certain hour each 
day. More than once he was late, and excused himself by saying 
that his watch was wrong. " Then," said the President, " if your 
watch is to blame, either you must get another watch or I must get 
another secretary." 

First I read the paragraph through, in order to be sure 
that every pupil understood all the words; next I read it 
sentence by sentence and the pupils took it down; and then 
I read it through rapidly, so that they might supply obvious 
omissions. There were twenty-eight boys in the class and 
eleven of them wrote the passage without error. More- 
over, five others made only one error each, and no boy in 
the class made more than ten. 

This ability to take dictation with such accuracy 
prompted me to make similar tests in our native tongue 
when I returned to America; and since I had tested the 
French pupils not only in French but in English, it was 
less difficult to make some comparisons. I began by dictat- 
ing the same anecdote to American boys and girls who were 
just as old as the French pupils. Then I extended the test 
to higher grades. At the time I write I have dictated the 
paragraph in eighteen different schools, to more than five 
hundred pupils. The cities in which I have given the test 



COMPOSITION 6 1 

range in size from a few thousand to a quarter-million; and 
in each instance I have given it only in schools suggested by 
the superintendent. In the total number of papers that I 
have secured in this manner there are, making full allowance 
for all possible variations in capitalization and punctuation, 
just eleven that are perfect. 1 Comparatively few approach 
perfection, and a very large number are full of the most 
egregious blunders. Words are left out, words are mis- 
spelled, punctuation is omitted, capitals are omitted, and 
capitals are put in where they do not belong. Many papers 
have as many as twenty errors each, and some have forty. 
This comparison and others of a similar kind that I have 
made are sufficient to convince one beyond doubt that the 
French boy of eleven or twelve has gained materially over 
the American boy of the same age in writing language 
accurately. - 

This advantage gained by the young French boy includes 
ability to spell. And when it is remembered that he learns, 
to spell chiefly through dictation, his progress ought to be 
significant to American teachers. A small part of his more 
thorough mastery of spelling may, perhaps, be attributed 
to the simpler orthography of the French language; but it 
must be a very small part. In the first place, French is not 
an extremely easy language to spell. Anyone who has 
attempted to write it, even in the most elementary way, 
knows that there are pitfalls for the unwary. And French 
teachers appreciate the difficulties that even the most con- 
scientious pupil must encounter. But there is another rea- 
son why the pupil's ability to spell cannot be attributed 

1 Five hundred college freshmen wrote forty-seven perfect papers. The 
French class which I have used in this comparison was unquestionably a 
very good one; but some of the American school classes were ranked as 
very good also. The college freshmen were in two state universities and 
two endowed colleges. 



62 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

wholly to simpler orthography: he is able to spell in Eng- 
lish, as well as in his own tongue. As I write, I have before 
me two hundred pages of exercises in English written by 
French boys ranging in age from nine to twelve years. 
With the exception of fifty pages, these are not selected 
papers, but are the work of the average of the classes from 
which I secured them; and in many instances they are 
classroom exercises written without preparation. Yet in 
all these there are only seven misspelled words. 1 

The greater part of this ability to spell we can attribute 
only to a well-developed spelling conscience; and dictation 
constitutes the chief means of its early development. In 
fact, I saw no spelling whatever of isolated lists of words such 
as we have in our spelling books. Instead, as I have already 
suggested, the pupils write the words from dictation in a 
normal context, and after they have written, they go over 
the entire paragraph and spell the words that afford most 
difficulty. Usually one boy spells while the others watch 
for errors in the speller's work and their own. If a boy is in 
doubt about a word that is not spelled in due course, he 
calls for it; and if the teacher questions anyone's ability to 
spell a word that has not been chosen by the boy who leads 
in the recitation, he immediately calls for that word. It 
may be seen, then, that spelling cannot easily be regarded 
as a useless exercise by the boy unless he looks upon the rest 
of his training in the mother tongue as equally useless. His 
spelling is not separated from his reading and writing. 

It is only because spelling is an extremely irritating prob- 
lem in America that I emphasize this particular value of 

1 These words are English (Inglish), stretch (strecht), umbrella (umbrela), 
weather (waether), raining (reaning), high (hight), and which (wich). In one 
city the pupils in the lycee spelled English words poorly, but the entire char- 
acter of the work in English was so far below that of the other cities I visited, 
that the spelling seemed to be only a part of the general neglect. 



COMPOSITION 63 

dictation. As was pointed out in an earlier paragraph, 
this is but one value among several, and perhaps not the 
most important. Punctuation, word order, sentence rela- 
tions, the meaning of words, the movement and balance of 
good writing, and the close relation of spoken and written 
language are also grounded deeply in the pupil's mind. 
When, therefore, he is practicing dictation, he is becoming 
so intimately acquainted with a number of essential matters 
that his knowledge of them passes over from mere knowledge 
to feeling, and thus becomes available as " second nature " 
when he is ready to write compositions of his own. 

III. MATERIAL FOR THEMES 

A. The Emphasis Placed on Good Material 

When we turn from the preliminary preparation for 
writing to the actual work of constructing original composi- 
tions, we find at the outset that the French teacher attaches 
unusual importance to the kind of material with which a 
pupil practices. It is possible to conceive of a time in the 
history of French education when the substance of a pupil's 
writing might have been sacrificed to the niceties of elegant 
expression; but certainly no such evil exists to-day. In 
truth, here in our own country, where we boast — some- 
times to our misfortune — that " substance is the thing," 
we give much less attention to the finding and developing of 
theme material than does the average teacher in France. It 
is true that the French are not yet satisfied with what they 
have accomplished in giving material its deserved place 
in the teaching of composition. In spite of the progress they 
have made, they believe that much yet remains to be done. 
But this very state of mind indicates how much importance 
is attached to subject-matter. 



64 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

Material receives much of the teacher's thought not only 
because in a given instance it has a large part in determin- 
ing the boy's success in his writing, but also because the 
subject-matter about which a boy writes from month to 
month and from year to year may be made an extremely 
influential part of his education. Here again we may ob- 
serve the results of the Frenchman's ability to see things in 
the large. Regardless of differences of opinion about 
questions of detail, teachers agree that theme material 
should have a threefold influence upon a pupil's life: it 
should cultivate (i) observation, (2) imagination, and (3) 
reflection or judgment. 

In daily practice, the French watchword is sincerity. 
Teachers and heads of schools feel that in the older days 
when the Classical languages dominated completely the 
teaching of the mother tongue, much of the material as- 
signed was to some extent beyond the pupil's mental reach. 
Consequently there is to-day a loud cry and a strict guard- 
ing' against the encouragement of any sort of intellectual 
hypocrisy. One may yet meet occasionally with a teacher 
who clings to the older method of giving his boys culture or 
finish, but he is so much alone and so thoroughly on the 
defensive that he seems to belong to another educational 
age. The teacher that one meets every day believes in 
making theme material vital by relating it to the pupil's life. 
Neither in the grade of the material nor in the type within 
the grade does he permit unnecessary temptation to false- 
hood or affectation. Thus it comes about that the very 
young boy does not attempt to write organized compositions 
at all; that his first efforts in original work require only 
direct observation or the memory of observation previously 
made; that the next in order require observation and im- 
agination; and that only as he approaches the end of his 



COMPOSITION 65 

course — that is to say, when he would be a senior in an 
American high school or a freshman in college — is the 
material he must write upon designed chiefly to encourage 
analysis or reflection. Of course, these lines of demarcation 
are not rigidly drawn. The young pupil is asked to reflect, 
and the oldest pupil is asked to observe and imagine; but 
the emphasis is first upon observation, then upon imagina- 
tion, and finally upon reflection. 

B. The Kind of Material Assigned 

The following theme subjects, chosen from a large number 
that were used in the secondary and primary school sys- 
tems, are, I believe, representative. In two or three in- 
stances I have given the class of subject, rather than the 
specific assignment for a given day, so that the field from 
which the short, frequent exercises are drawn may be more 
readily seen. In all other instances I have used the subject 
just as it was dictated to the pupil. 

Note that the French teacher does not assign a title 
merely. Sometimes he suggests a title, sometimes he leaves 
the pupil free to draw a title from the subject assigned; but 
in every instance he gives a full statement of the subject, 
so that a boy cannot fail to understand the nature of the 
work he is to attempt. Note, too, that the subjects calling 
for analytical treatment are not based upon reading alone, 
and that very frequently some idea in a given piece of litera- 
ture, rather than the piece itself, is to be treated. The 
earlier themes based on reading, are usually either reproduc- 
tions expressed in the pupil's own wOrds, or very simple 
expressions of opinion or preference. 

(1) Subjects calling chiefly for accurate observation. Age 
of pupils, from ten to thirteen years. 



66 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

(a) Oral and written reproduction of passages read before the class 
and explained by the teacher. These lessons were drawn from history, 
geography, literature, and elementary science. 

[In the primary school from which I secured this assignment, the 
teacher called for a written lesson of this kind at least once a month 
throughout the year. Age of the pupils, eleven.] 

(b) The description of a simple object, such as a hammer, football, 
book-satchel, apple, or hat. Remember that description may appeal 
to all the senses. One should speak, then, of the shape of the object, 
its size, color, and, if important, its odor and touch. 

[The object for a given lesson was, of course, specifically indicated 
by the teacher.] 

(c) Tell how a robin (or some other bird) builds its nest. 

(d) Have you ever observed how your classmates enter the recita- 
tion-room ? Write an account of the way they enter one of your 
classes to-day, to-morrow, or the day following. 

(e) Write a letter to a big brother who is serving his time in the 
army. What are some of the things you would be sure to tell him ? 

(/) In a letter to a boy who has recently visited you, announce the 
sudden, accidental death of a common friend. 

(g) Explain some game that you play. Be sure to speak of the 
kind of game, whether of skill or of chance; the material employed, 
and the placing of it; the number of players; and the important rules 
one must follow. 

(h) Describe a classmate, a teacher, or some one seen frequently 
along the street. 

[This description was to be purely physical; no attempt was to be 
made to characterize the person.] 

(i) Write a characterization of some one whom you know inti- 
mately. 

[This assignment was accompanied by a full discussion of the 
qualities the pupil ought to be able to see, and by an explanation of 
the relation of characterization and purely physical description.] 

(J) Have you ever observed the calm appearance of things just at 
the end of the day ? Write about the end of the day as you see it 
where you live. 

As one might infer from what was said in Chapter II 
about the clearly different aims of the two school systems, 
the emphasis placed on a given kind of material is deter- 



COMPOSITION 67 

mined largely by the system in which the assignments are 
made. For example, in an elementary secondary school I 
found that the four assignments for the month of March 
were as follows: (1) one reproduction of a subject discussed 
in class; (2) two simple narratives; and (3) a letter on a 
familiar subject. In a corresponding primary school the 
eight assignments were: (1) one reproduction of a subject 
discussed in class; (2) one simple narrative; (3) three 
descriptions of plants; and (4) three descriptions of 
animals. Nevertheless, the chief purpose in the lower 
classes of the two systems is the same ; namely, to encourage 
observation and to develop the pupil's power to write down 
what he sees. 

(2) Subjects which in the main require imaginative treat- 
ment. Age of the pupils, thirteen to fifteen years. 

(a) Write a letter to the Prefect asking that an old friend who lost 
an arm in the Franco-Prussian war be put in charge of a tobacco shop 
that has become vacant. 

[The French government holds a monopoly on tobacco, and directs 
its sale.] 

(b) Citronet is the worst little " mucker " in the village. (Sketch 
his physical and moral qualities and his personal history.) One day 
he crouched down on the rear part of a big automobile that stopped 
for an instant in the public square. He meant to jump off at the end 
of the village, but the speed was too great; and the driver did not stop 
until he had gone fifty miles. Describe the astonishment of the party 
when they discovered Citronet — and in what a state! Generous, 
they took him to the nearest railroad station and bought him a third- 
class ticket for the return trip. Impressions of the return. 

(c) The Loire is out of bank. On a little island that the high 
waters have formed, a hare finds himself imprisoned. A man sees 
him there and smiles to himself at the easy capture he can make. In a 
small boat he rows to the island. He climbs out, ties the boat hastily, 
and endeavors to catch his game. The hare, hard pressed in the 
chase, leaps into the boat; his weight is sufficient to pull the cord 
loose. Thus he rides off downstream and leaves the man a captive on 
the island. 



68 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS. TO WRITE 

(d) I was present one day at the departure of the swallows. It was 
in the morning. The telegraph wires and some of the roofs near by- 
were alive with birds that chattered and circled about. All at once, 
as if at a signal given, they departed in a compact flock toward the 
south. My thought followed them in their flight, and I amused 
myself by picturing the countries and the bodies of water that they 
would traverse in their rapid course. 

(e) What are some of the characteristic aspects of Paris life (the 
crowds, the boulevards, the shops, etc.) on New Year's Day ? 

[This subject was assigned, of course, in a Paris school.] 

(/) Winter is almost over. Do you notice any signs of spring ? 
What, after all, are the sure indications that spring is approaching ? 

(g) It has rained a long time ; the river is heavy and yellow. Little 
by little it rises until the water reaches the houses closest to its banks; 
soon it invades the neighboring streets; the alarm is given. . . . The 
people proceed with the hasty movings; many of the scenes bring 
tears to the eyes of the rescuers. Some of the courageous men save 
victims from the water; others assist them in getting from the in- 
undated houses. As they struggle against the great scourge, one feels 
the souls of men growing in charity and fraternity. 

[Given at Paris, where the memories of the destructive flood of 
1910-n were still vivid.] 

Qi) By drawing upon your memory and imagination, recount a 
journey that you supposedly take in an aeroplane. If you like, ex- 
plain what part this journey has led you to believe air travel will play 
in the life of to-morrow. 

(i) You pass your vacation in a very small village in Normandy 
where airships are not often seen. One day some one hears a hum- 
ming noise above the housetops. It is a dirigible. Give an account 
of the impressions that this grand event produces, and the comments 
and reflections that it excites. 

(j) You see a miserable-looking boy take a small loaf of bread from 
the show-window of a bakery and eat it in a dark corner near by. 
Describe the scene. Do you intervene and, if you do, in what manner ? 
Why? 

(3) Subjects that, in the main, require analysis, thinking, 
reflection. Age of the pupils, fifteen to eighteen years. 

(o) Reflect upon this thought expressed by a contemporary author, 
making use of your own observation and experience. 

" Everything I saw passing in the street, — the people, the beasts, 
and the inanimate objects, — contributed more than one would be- 



COMPOSITION 69 

lieve to my appreciation of the simple and the strong in life. Nothing 
is better than the street for acquainting a child with the social ma- 
chine. ... He must have breathed the air of the street in order to 
feel that the law of labor is divine and that everyone must perform 
his task in the world." 

(Anatole France, Le Livre de mm ami, page 157.) 

(b) What are the three or four qualities that you prefer above all 
others in your friends ? 

(c) Do you agree with Sainte-Beuve in his expression of this wish ? 
" To be born, to live, and to die in the same house! " 

(d) Jean- Jacques Rousseau declared that books were the instru- 
ments of childhood's greatest misery. He would not put them in the 
hands of children before the age of twelve, " reading being the greatest 
scourge of early youth." In a letter to some friend, say what you 
think of this opinion. If you do not agree with it, point out some of 
the pleasurable advantages that children gain from being able to read. 

(e) Victor Hugo, writing to one of his friends about 1835, said that 
he had many sources of inspiration: the daily happenings, the spec- 
tacle of nature, the joys and apprehensions that stir humanity now as 
always. But he found his greatest pleasure, he explained, in calling 
up the memories of his happy childhood and in living over all the 
friendships and affections of his infancy and the years of his educa- 
tion. And to this pleasure he added that of seeing his own children 
about him and smiling at their innocent gaiety. He dreamed, he 
said, of becoming the great poet of family life and fireside joys. 

In the poems of Hugo that you have read, recall the influences of 
this love for home life. 

(/) Have you formed any notion of the role of chance and the role 
of personal merit in the affairs of fife ? What is it ? 

(g) What do you think of the oft-repeated words: " The absurd 
man is the one who never changes his mind " ? 

(h) The Abbe de Saint-Pierre has sent his Projet de paix perpet- 
uelle to Fontenelle. Compose Fontenelle's response. 

(i) A sculptor is reducing a block of marble. At each stroke the 
marble groans sadly. The sculptor asks for the cause of these com- 
plaints. The marble declares that it suffers from the wounds. " But 
why should you complain," demands the sculptor, " when my chisel 
is making the statue of a god ? " Develop the dialogue. 

(j) By drawing upon your own experience in the study of the 
philosophic writers of the eighteenth century, write a letter to a young 
English friend who in his course in French is about to take up the 
study of Montesquieu. 



70 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

(k) Analyze in the Morceaux Choisis of Desgranges, pp. 216-18, 
the extract from Montaigne and set forth (degager) : (1) Montaigne's 
theories of education; (2) the characteristics of his style; (3) some 
general characteristics of the Renaissance. 

(/) Show in Lamartine's Vlsolement the essential characteristics 
of the romantic state of mind. 

(m) Charles VIII had a natural taste for grand exploits and heroic 
adventures. One day he was enthusiastically reading the Chanson 
de Roland. Anne de Beaujeu tried to turn his attention to more 
practical matters. Try to imagine the scene and the conversation. 

(n) J.-J. Rousseau loved nature only in her wild state. He said of 
the French gardens of the seventeenth century: " To what purpose 
are these walks, so straight, so carefully covered with sand, that are 
found everywhere ? and these stars, that, instead of spreading before 
the eyes the magnitude of a park, as is imagined, serve clumsily 
to show its limits? Does one see in the midst of a forest the sands of 
a river-bed ? or does the foot find a sweeter comfort in the sand than 
on the moss or the greensward ? Does nature employ the square and 
the rule unceasingly ? Is it feared that she will be recognized in 
something, in spite of all the pains taken to disfigure her ? " 

Take a walk through the gardens of the Grand and the Petit 
Trianon [the material was assigned in the lycee at Versailles] and 
reflect upon this criticism by Rousseau. Do you agree with him ? 

A glance at the last group of subjects will convince one 
that the French boy of sixteen or seventeen years must do 
some actual thinking for himself. And so far as I had 
opportunity to observe, he is able to do it. He does not, I 
am sure, excel the American boy of the same age in imagina- 
tive power. The American boy, in spite of all that is said 
about our utilitarian, commercial existence, has quite a 
good imagination. Moreover, by force of our free, new, 
rapidly developing business and social life, he has a wider 
vision of the possibilities of the world than the French boy 
has. But when a subject calls for reflection, for pondering 
upon important points, for tracing out subordinate lines of 
thought, for thinking, the French boy of the same age is his 
superior. The French boy thinks rapidly, accurately, and, 



COMPOSITION 71 

despite all the dissertations on French superficiality, he 
penetrates into things. If subjects similar to the ones in- 
cluded in this last group were drawn from English litera- 
ture and assigned to American college freshmen, how many 
of them would be able to treat the material in any satisfac- 
tory manner whatsoever ? 

The boy in the lycee finds a powerful stimulus to write on 
literary subjects of this kind in the prospect of his bacca- 
laureate examination. 1 This examination, conducted by 
an impartial jury that is in no official way related to the 
lycee from which a boy comes, is decidedly rigid, and the 
composition that is required is usually regarded as the most 
difficult part of all. The candidate must not only possess 
knowledge about literature, but he must understand the 
literature itself, he must be able to reflect upon new literary 
relations or new ideas suggested by the examiners, and he 
must be able to explain himself to others. The following 
subjects are typical of those assigned in recent years. In 
a given examination the candidate chooses one subject from 
a list of three. 2 He must write the composition in a period 
of three hours. Ordinarily he writes not more than a 
dozen pages. 

It is said customarily that the literature of the seventeenth century 
was impersonal; that is, the personality of the writer did not reveal 
itself. Discuss this assertion. 
Lille, July, 1906. 

" Victor Hugo," wrote a critic, " thinks only in images." And the 
great poet's imaginative power always has been admired. By study- 
ing the images in some poem of his that you care to choose, see if you 
can determine just what this power is. 
Rennes, October, 1905. 

1 For a further discussion of the baccalaureate examination and its 
influence on the mother tongue, see Chapter VII. 

2 The subjects are arranged by groups and by academies in Annates du 
Baccalaureat. Librairie Vuibert. In a few instances I have relied upon 
other sources. 



72 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

Many writers, among others J.-J. Rousseau and Lamartine, have 
attacked the morality of La Fontaine's Fables. Can one well defend it? 
Nancy, July, 1909. 

Write what you know and what you think of the three unities. 
Grenoble, October, 1907. 

If you were resolved to follow the life of a colonist, what French 
colony should you prefer to inhabit ? Indicate the reasons for your 
choice. 
Poitiers, October, 1908. 

Discuss this thought of Joubert and verify it by examples drawn 
from the literature of the last three centuries: " The writers who have 
influence are only the men who express perfectly what others think, 
and who awaken in the minds of others the ideas or sentiments that 
tend to unfold and develop." 
Lyon, July, 1905. 

Is it accurate to say with Buffon that genius is only long patience ? 
Paris, October, 1906. 

" Who is the man," asked Madame de Stael, " whose genius is not, 
in a great many respects, the result of the age in which he lived ? " 
Comment on this thought, and support your position with two ex- 
amples, one from political history and one from literature. 
Rennes, July, 1906. 

What do you think of this idea expressed by Thiers in the preface 
of his Histoire de la Revolution ? " Perhaps the best time to write 
history is just when the participants are ready to die. One can then 
collect their testimony without sharing their passions." 
Lyon, October, 1907. 

Victor Hugo has written this sentence, rich in meaning in its con- 
ciseness: "Lyrical genius: to be oneself; dramatic genius: to be 
others." What do you think about it ? 
Poitiers, July, 1907. 

Explain and refute this thought expressed by Maeterlinck (L 'Intelli- 
gence des fleurs, the chapter entitled V Inquietude de notre morale) : 
"In this life there are only two real evils: sickness and poverty; 
and two true and irreducible goods: health and riches." 
Bordeaux, July, 19 13. 

A Une Jeune Morte 
Comme on voit sur la branche au mois de mai la rose 
En sa belle jeunesse, en sa premiere fleur, 
Rendre le ciel jaloux de sa vive couleur, 
Quand l'aube de ses pleurs au point du jour l'arrose, 



COMPOSITION 73 

La grace dans sa feuille et l'amour se repose, 
P2mbaumant les jardins et les arbres d'odeur; 
Mais, battue ou de pluie ou d'excessive ardeur, 
Languissante elle meurt, feuille a feuille declose. 

Ainsi, en ta premiere et jeune nouveaute, 
Quand la terre et le ciel honoraient ta beaute, 
La Parque t'a tuee, et cendre tu reposes. 

Pour obseques recois mes larmes et mes pleurs, 
Ce vase plein de lait, ce panier plein de fleurs, 
Ann que, vif et mort, ton corps ne soit que roses. 

(Ronsard, Amours, II, 14.) 

Justify, from the point of view of thought, sentiment, and style, 
the judgment of M. Emile Faguet on this sonnet: "... marvelous 
little poem, the finest perhaps and the most finished of all the works 
of Ronsard." 
Grenoble, October, 1913. 

When the news of the death of Washington reaches France (1799), 
La Fayette writes to one of his friends. In deploring this loss, he 
reviews some of the principal episodes in the life of Washington. What 
a work he leaves after him ! What great teachings in the examples he 
has given! [Develop.] 
Aix-Marseille, July, 1913. 

It is said of the eighteenth century that it was peculiarly " the 
century of ideas." What is to be understood by that ? Indicate 
some ideas that we owe to the eighteenth century. 
Paris, October, 19 13. 

Who is your favorite poet ? Explain the kind of pleasure that you 
derive from reading him. Above all, refrain from reciting a lesson you 
have learned; say simply, and as elegantly as you can, that which 
you have understood, you. And do not write upon this subject unless 
you can discuss a poet who is known to you through your own read- 
ing of his works and whom you prefer to all others through your own 
personal taste. Literary platitudes will only injure your case. Give 
extreme care to organization and style. 
Rennes, July, 1913. 

What benefit have you derived from the practice of translating ? 
Aix-Marseille, October, 19 13. 

Of all the great [modern] foreign writers that you have read, which 
one seems to you to have enriched your intellectual and moral life 
most ? Develop the reasons for your choice, and indicate how you 
are indebted to this writer. 
Paris, July, 1913. 



74 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

Victor Hugo wrote in the preface to Ruy Bias; " That which the 
crowd demands almost exclusively in a dramatic work is action; that 
which the women wish before all is passion; that which the thinkers 
search for especially is character." Explain this view, and see if 
among the plays you know, you can think of any that meet equally all 
three of these requirements. 
Lille, July, 1913. 

Develop: La Fontaine, at the Academy, in a discussion relative to 
the Dictionary, defends the old French language against the scruples 
of those who, under pretext of purifying the language, impoverish it. 
Grenoble, July, 1913. 

France possesses a vast colonial empire. Why ought she to keep 
it, to develop it, to defend it ? 
Caen, July, 1913. 

A letter from Washington, President of the United States, to his 
friend La Fayette (August, 1789). 

He congratulates him on having helped to give liberty to France, 
after having done so much toward the liberty of the United States. 

He praises La Fayette for having — after the revolution of July 14 
— established order and tranquillity, conditions essential to liberty. 

At the end he gives him some news, and tells him especially about 
the conditions of the republic: the constitution (quite recent, 1787) 
is beginning to have effect and to strengthen the United States, etc. 
Lille, October, 1913. 

[A specimen group of subjects. The candidate chooses one.] 

(a) Discuss this theory of Chateaubriand : " It is very proper and 
very useful to understand, to study, to read living foreign languages, 
rather dangerous to speak them, and extremely dangerous to write 
them." 

(b) General Bonaparte said in December, 1799, in a proclamation: 
" The first qualities of a soldier are steadiness and discipline; only 
after these comes valor." You will explain this thought, illustrating 
it, if you can, with some examples drawn from our history. 

(c) Is one justified in saying " the gentle Racine " ? x 
Paris, July, 1913. 

It should be said that the character of the entire school 
programme helps to develop this power to analyze, to 

1 I am aware that " the gentle Racine " is a very imperfect rendering of 
" le doux Racine." 



COMPOSITION 75 

reflect. Nevertheless, a large part of it is due to the care 
and the skill with which subjects for written work are 
assigned. Above the elementary classes the material is 
never wholly new, never wholly familiar. The general 
practice 1 is to assign material just within reach, so that 
with the illumination which results from the classroom 
preparation for writing, the pupils will have enough ac- 
quaintance with the subject to keep them from becoming 
discouraged, yet not enough to make them feel satisfied 
and indifferent. 

C. The Preparation of Material 
In helping pupils toward the actual process of writing 
down what they have to say, the French teachers so gener- 
ally follow one practice that it must be regarded as an essen- 
tial part of their method of instruction. This is the working 
over of material in the classroom. Teachers seem to feel 
that their first duty is to arouse the boy's interest in his 
subject and to put his mind in motion. He is made to feel 
at the outset that he must not attempt to organize his 
material — much less to write — until he knows what the 
material really is. Hence much emphasis is placed upon 
what one teacher aptly called the imaginative part of com- 
posing. That is to say, the boy is encouraged to let his 
power of association run free for the purpose of collecting 
as many ideas or images as possible. His only aim is to 
reach the limits of his subject; nothing that promises to be 
of the least value is permitted to escape. After these mis- 
cellaneous ideas or images are jotted down or by some other 
means fixed in mind, the members of the class examine them 
more carefully. And here, it might be observed in passing, 

1 In the secondary schools, the teacher has very clear directions concerning 
the assignment of material. These directions, in the main, represent the 
practice of the best teachers. See Instructions, pp. 78 and 80 f. 



76 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

speech is brought into use as an aid to writing. The exer- 
cise does not partake in the least of the nature of a formal 
lesson in oral composition, but the members of the class 
must speak accurately and clearly. The teacher questions 
the pupils, the pupils question the teacher, and the pupils 
question one another. The purpose is not to provide the 
indolent with material that is ready to use, but to give 
everyone enough of a basis to enable him to do thinking of 
his own. In the lower grades, the exercise is frequently 
nothing more than questions and answers designed to reveal 
the accuracy with which observations have been made ; but 
in the higher grades it assumes the character of an interest- 
ing round-table discussion. Let us consider a specific 
instance. 

The boys in the class were sixteen years old. The subject 
set for the composition was the one quoted from Anatole 
France * on a preceding page: " Everything I saw passing in 
the street, — the people, the beasts, the inanimate objects, 
— contributed more than one would believe to my apprecia- 
tion of the simple and the strong in life. Nothing is better 
than the street for acquainting a child with the social 
machine. ... He must have breathed the air of the street 
in order to learn that the law of labor is divine and that 
every man must perform his task in the world." On the day 
set apart for the reading of the themes written on this sub- 
ject, the discussion that preceded the constructive criticism 
(see page 82) revealed the fact that even the smallest details 
of the subject had been taken up in the classroom before any 
of the pupils had begun to write. It was very obvious that 
the members of the class had sought together to define " the 
social machine "; that they had noted the author's power of 
close observation; and that they had talked of the life of the 

1 This seemed to be a favorite subject. 



COMPOSITION 77 

street as they themselves knew it, and had made a list of the 
objects which give the street its variety. This list included 
soldiers, the military band, grocers, chauffeurs, scissors- 
grinders, poor women selling cherries or apples, coal dealers, 
bakers, thrifty shop-owners, day-laborers, wealthy men and 
women in automobiles, beggars, children selling flowers, and 
many other parts of " the social machine." Then everyone 
had tried to imagine the kind of houses these different 
classes of people went to at the close of the day; the kind of 
food they ate; the kind of clothes they wore in the evening; 
the spirit of their family life; the subjects of their conversa- 
tion; and even the newspapers they probably read. All of 
these matters had been talked over without restraint in the 
classroom; and it was only after the pupils had seen the 
material in this very concrete way that they were asked to 
think about its significance and to put their conclusions into 
organized form. 1 

The French teacher's relation to the pupil who is organiz- 
ing material for a theme is deserving of notice. He does not 
relieve himself of responsibility by saying to the pupil, 
" Now you have seen some of the material that our subject 
includes; write what you have to say." Instead, he re- 
gards the pupil all the while — especially in the lower and 
middle grades — as a learner who needs direction. He does 
not look upon a fourteen-year-old boy as a sufficient master 
of thought and language to write, unaided, about a subject 
of any consequence. " If he is able to do this," I was fre- 
quently told, " then he needs no teacher." And there 
seems to be no fear whatever about destroying the pupil's 
self-reliance. It seems to be taken for granted that a boy 

1 After this chapter was made into page proof I received from a French 
lycee several outlines and themes developed in this manner by teacher and 
pupils on "The Supposed Speech of Theodore Roosevelt at Chicago in 
Favor of the Allies." 



78 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

may develop self-reliance through foresight as well as 
through unguided struggle. 

The character of the teacher's assistance depends, of 
course, on the age of the pupils and the kind of material. 
In classes of boys ten or twelve years old, I saw the teacher 
go to the extent of working out with the pupils a fairly 
definite plan of the composition they were to write. Some- 
times, too, a pupil was called upon to give a little lecture 
of three or five minutes, so that he and the class might see 
how much there was to say on the subject, and how all the 
material, if thought through clearly, would fall readily into 
place. Here is an example, — which incidentally repre- 
sents a type of " moral " subject that one finds now and 
then, particularly in the primary schools. The teacher 
and pupils discussed the assignment for a time and made 
this rough plan on the blackboard: 

So Far as Possible We should be Obliging to 
Everybody 
I. An example. 

i. The service rendered. 
2. The recompense. 
II. The scope of the subject. 

III. Recollection of various instances. 

IV. Concluding observations. 

Then several pupils were asked to tell briefly how they would 
treat the subject, and to give instances of the rewards of 
being thoughtful for others. After these little lectures, 
each pupil turned immediately to the task of converting 
the general outline into a specific composition. In the 
upper classes, the assignment may be made without much 
supplementary comment if the theme is to be based upon 
reading. I noticed, however, that when a specific poem 
or passage of prose constituted the subject-matter of the 
theme, the classroom discussion was very complete. 



COMPOSITION 79 

IV. THE CRITICISM OF THEMES 

A. Ideals in Criticism 

Although teachers of the mother tongue do not hold with 
perfect unanimity to one ideal in grading written work, one 
party is to-day so overwhelmingly in the majority that it 
may almost be said to represent the conviction of the entire 
country. There was a time — I was told frequently, and 
could easily accept the statement as the truth — when a 
large per cent of the teachers insisted that every pupil, 
regardless of his interests or his plans for life, should write 
with conventional literary finish. But to-day the pre- 
vailing belief is that, above all, a boy should be able to think 
with vigor, to organize his thoughts with sureness, and to 
express himself with correctness and with faithfulness to his 
own temperament and character. In other words, most 
teachers believe that the great body of boys in the upper 
grades should be trained in normal expression, rather than 
in any special graces that might be desired by the occasional 
genius. The prevailing ideal, then, is not to make a great 
body of literary writers, however desirable it might be to do 
so, but to enable boys, whatever their chief interests in life, 
to think their thoughts out into the best expression possible, 
to record their feelings with accuracy and honesty, and to 
feel the importance of putting everything into good form. 
There is no abandoning of the ideal of good form; the 
majority of the teachers to-day insist merely that there be 
a wider interpretation of the term so that it may be applied 
to things practical and scientific as well as to things wholly 
literary. 

Invariably in criticism, teachers dwell upon subject- 
matter and its organization. Contrary to popular peda- 
gogical notions current in some parts of our own country, 



80 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

French teachers do not busy themselves with lessons in 
literary millinery or any other artificial kind of decoration. 
Of course, in the early grades the matters to receive chief 
attention are ordinary accuracy and conventional correct- 
ness. In the upper grades, however, these give way to 
problems of structure. Material, the larger and smaller 
questions of organization, the total effect of what has been 
written, — these are the matters that receive chief con- 
sideration. The examination of any large number of 
graded themes will help one to see the force of this assertion. 
" You seem to have a firm grasp of the subject." " The 
repetition of the same idea here weakens the effect of the 
entire theme." " You introduce the subject well." " The 
introduction is beside the point; the purpose of an intro- 
duction is to introduce." " The introduction is too long; it 
leads you away from your subject." " The ideas are to the 
point, although some of them are not treated fully enough, 
and they are expressed in a style at once correct and extremely 
clear." " Where does this paragraph belong ? It seems to 
stand out in space." " You have used your imagination 
well." " Your reflection seems not to have been very 
profound." So the marginal comments run. 

To be sure, mechanical details are not overlooked if they 
need attention; but in the higher grades one finds compara- 
tively few faults of this kind. In my visits from school to 
school it was a perpetual delight to see the thoughtfully 
prepared, carefully and cleanly written manuscripts that 
pupils submitted. I do not wish to leave the impression 
that France is an ideal land where pupils write only good 
compositions; but most pupils write with a large degree of 
care. The spirit of the school fosters accuracy and thought- 
fulness. ,And in cases where the inevitable poor pupil risks 
violating custom by handing in " sloppy " work, the teacher 



COMPOSITION 81 

is likely to regard his action as a personal insult. Thus it 
comes about that the feeling among pupils against careless- 
ness and childish errors is so pronounced that the teacher of 
advanced classes need say comparatively little concerning 
" the mechanics " of writing. He can place emphasis upon 
larger matters because he is reasonably free from the neces- 
sity of trying to correct faults that should have been dealt 
with in the earlier grades of the school. 

B. The Method of Criticism 

The usual method of criticising themes is significant in at 
least two respects. In the first place, the teacher makes a 
very large part of his criticism orally in the presence of the 
entire class. The written criticism is not slighted. But the 
vigorous classroom discussion is regarded as the chief means 
of helping pupils to do better work. 

Ordinarily when the teacher begins this oral part of the 
criticism, he first satisfies himself that the pupils are wide 
awake and intent upon the matter in hand. Sometimes he 
accomplishes this end by asking rapid-fire questions about a 
number of different themes ; sometimes he directs questions 
to three or four pupils about one theme; and sometimes he 
calls a pupil to the desk, asks him to stand so that his class- 
mates may hear, and then plies him with questions solely 
about the theme he himself has submitted. In some such 
manner the teacher stimulates an intellectual activity that 
is a sure guarantee against lifelessness in the lesson proper. 
Once this is begun, the teacher usually gives all his attention 
to the discussion of a few typical weaknesses or typical evi- 
dences of strength. There is no over-magnifying of details 
— if the pupil has neglected them he is hastily ridiculed or 
completely ignored — and there is little turning aside to 
matters that are only incidental. Almost all effort is 



82 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

directed upon a few essential matters that are vital to a 
large per cent of the class. 

The method of criticism is significant, secondly, because 
of its genuinely constructive nature. Teachers, as a rule, 
do not content themselves with showing pupils how themes 
are faulty or weak or uninteresting, but point out clearly 
how they might be made better. Prevailing faults are 
dealt with, most certainly; but much more time is devoted 
to pointing out qualities that are good. Frequently poor 
work is put alongside good work, so that the pupils may see 
more readily just how far the one is from the other. Some- 
times the comparison is humiliating to one of the pupils, but 
the teacher seems to worry very little about that fact. He 
wants the comparison to have its full force. Neither does 
he group all the grades of the better pupils between 90 and 
92 1V 1 He does not deal harshly with the pupil who because 
of little ability cannot do well; but he does not try to con- 
ceal anyone's weakness. His purpose is to lead all the 
pupils of the class to do better the next time, and if one 
boy's fault will be of service to himself or his classmates in 
future work, the teacher's sensitiveness about " hurting 
some one's feelings " is not likely to stand in the way. He 
points out pitfalls, and he dwells upon the good qualities 
that individual themes possess. Then he is almost certain 
to follow a plan of rebuilding that is recommended in the 
Instructions 2 for secondary teachers. In this he and the 
pupils bring together the good qualities of the themes that 
have been read, and the teacher's and the pupils' best 
notions of what a theme ought to be, and fuse them into 
a kind of ideal theme, so that every pupil may see how good 

1 Most teachers, I noticed, graded work on the basis of 20, and it was 
not unusual to see the grades range from 4 or 6 to 18 or 19. Usually each 
pupil was required to stand up when the teacher announced his grade. 

2 Page 82. 



COMPOSITION 83 

the work would be if it were the result of the combined 
intelligence of the class. Thus no pupil is left with the 
crushing conviction that there is no direction in which he 
may improve himself. 

C. The Spirit of the Criticism 

The spirit of the classroom criticism is at once sympa- 
thetic and stimulating. It cannot be said to be arbitrary, 
yet it is not so vague or indefinite or " broad " that it loses 
its force. If the matter under consideration at a given time 
admits of positive decision, the teacher renders the decision 
and the case ends there. If it is a question of good or 
better, or bad or worse, and the teacher expresses his 
opinion, he ordinarily explains his position. But in all 
cases of mere opinion, pupils are encouraged to follow their 
own reasoning or their own feeling; and if they do not agree 
with the teacher, they usually have the utmost liberty in 
expressing their dissent. The result is an exceedingly frank 
and open relation between pupil and teacher and between 
pupil and pupil. The boy is sure to feel that the teacher 
remembers how perplexing it is to learn to write; but he 
seldom has reason for believing that the teacher will be a 
substitute for his own power of thinking. He is expected 
to use his own intelligence and he must measure it not only 
with the intelligence of his classmates but with that of his 
teacher. I frequently saw classes so thoroughly in earnest 
about some question growing out of their written exercises 
that it was with difficulty that the teacher prevented all the 
members from speaking at once. Perhaps as frequently I 
saw the boys in the class stand unanimously, or almost 
unanimously, against the teacher; and they took a respect- 
ful delight in putting him on the defensive. Fortunately 
he was usually so well prepared to defend himself that he 



84 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

accepted their challenge gladly, and without the slightest 
loss of temper put them to their wit's end in an effort to 
maintain their position. This characteristic kind of criti- 
cism is, then, neither deadening nor consoling. It is a kind 
of good-natured warfare in which there is enough of the 
sting of battle to keep one active, and enough reward to 
make the participants feel that they are moving forward. 
I have never seen a better means of making advanced pupils 
feel that writing is a vital question of conscience which 
everyone must in a large measure settle for himself. 



D. Economy in Grading Themes 

Conscientious criticism of this kind makes great de- 
mands upon a teacher's energy and time; there is no 
denying the fact. It seems to be clearly understood by 
French teachers of the mother tongue that the grading of 
themes implies long hours of patient labor. I found no 
teacher who professed to believe that anybody could dis- 
cover a " royal incline " that would save one from the an- 
noyance of serious effort. There seemed to be a definite 
feeling that only the very simplest labor-saving devices 
are worth while. I saw no magical methods of having pupils 
improve their writing while the themes were carefully con- 
cealed in the teacher's desk until they were forgotten — 
by both pupils and teacher; I discovered no complicated 
systems of symbols and exponents as a substitute for 
corrections or even conferences; and I saw no idealistic 
schemes of having the pupils themselves or the teachers in 
other departments help to grade the papers submitted in 
classes in the mother tongue. Pupils frequently grade one 
another's themes, but the exercise is designed primarily 
to help the pupils rather than the teacher. The great, 



COMPOSITION 85 

heavy burden of theme-reading is regarded by teachers as 
one of the inevitable but fruitful duties of their pro- 
fession. 

There are, however, a number of things that serve to 
economize the teacher's energy and to render his work much 
less disagreeable than most American teachers of English 
think theme-reading must always be. In the first place, 1 
because of the exacting drill to which the pupil has been 
submitted in his early life, his themes are not so full of 
faults. Then, as we shall see in Chapter VII, the French; 
teacher, with the exception of the lower grade teacher in the 
primary school system, is not obliged to work so many hours 
a week that he has no spare time for marking written exer- 
cises. Again, he does not look upon theme-correcting as a 
disgraceful kind of drudgery that ought to be heaped upon 
some one who has not the ambition or the intelligence to do 
the less strictly routine part of the teacher's work. This 
wholesome attitude in itself tends to make the reading less 
irksome. Then, too, the broad training which teachers 
have received gives them a rich background that is espe- 
cially serviceable in marking themes. Finally, and chiefly, 
the French teacher saves himself almost immeasurably by 
the careful preparation he requires the pupils to make before 
they begin writing. Instead of leaving a score of questions 
unsettled when he assigns a subject, he suggests, warns, and, 
through the methods I have already mentioned, brings the 
pupils to foresee and guard against a great many errors that 
otherwise would rise up for treatment after the themes had 
been submitted. Aside from the unmistakable influence 
that these pre-writing discussions have upon a pupil's habit 
of thought, they save the teacher an overwhelming amount 
of unnecessary labor. 



86 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

V. THE WRITING AND SPEAKING IN OTHER SUBJECTS 

The value of the training the French boy receives in his 
courses in composition is increased materially by the char- 
acter of the writing he is required to do in other subjects. 
It would be exaggeration, assuredly, to say that his writing 
in these other subjects is always done just as carefully as 
that which he submits to his teacher of composition; and it 
would be just as great an overstatement to say that every 
teacher of mathematics, botany, and history is as much 
interested in the character of his pupils' writing as he is in 
the subject he teaches. Nevertheless, the quality of this 
writing which is done as a part of the work in other classes 
receives a degree of attention from both pupil and teacher 
that in America may be found only in unusual instances. 
Teachers in France would protest against the assertion 
that they had attained an ideal condition in this respect; 
many of them feel, as we feel in America, that other de- 
partments too often neglect the quality of pupils' lan- 
guage. Yet when one compares the practices of the two 
countries, one cannot refrain from felicitating the teacher of 
the mother tongue in France upon the more conscientious, 
more intelligent support he receives from his colleagues in 
other fields of study. The result is not difficult to see. 
When the boy is obliged to write well in his other courses, 
he sooner or later reaches the conclusion that all writing is 
important. He therefore not only gains from the thought- 
ful practice which he carries on in history, civics, and phys- 
ics or botany, but he derives new profit from his instruction 
in composition. His teacher of the mother tongue ceases 
to be a person who is paid to talk about something that 
is unimportant except to himself, and becomes a person 
of consequence who can help one in doing what everybody 
seems to think is worth doing well. 



COMPOSITION 87 

A large part of this outside writing is done in the general 
notebook that every pupil in the lower and middle grades is 
required to keep. In it, as was pointed out at the beginning 
of this chapter, the boy writes almost everything save his 
regular compositions, which are written on theme paper or 
in a special set of composition books. Assignments for the 
following day, the solution of problems in arithmetic, lessons 
in vocabulary, experiments in elementary science, dictations 
in the mother tongue, lessons in grammar, questions on the 
reading lesson for the succeeding day, lessons in orthog- 
raphy, lessons in geography, and maxims upon which 
pupils might ponder with profit, — all these are copied in 
the general notebook. A series of these books, then, con- 
stitutes a rather complete record of a pupil's daily school 
life; and, as might be supposed, the amount of writing which 
their preparation requires is considerable. One set which I 
brought away with me consists of sixteen well-filled note- 
books of thirty good-sized pages each, or nearly five hundred 
pages in all. These were written by a boy of thirteen in the 
course of one school year. Now it may be seen readily that 
this writing, if done under any reasonably favorable cir- 
cumstances, would give a boy much practice in expressing 
himself correctly and clearly. When, however, he writes 
with the full conviction that his work will be examined crit- 
ically, the value of the practice is greatly increased. He 
knows that the teacher will call for his book from time to 
time and mark it up with red ink very much as if it were a 
theme; so he writes carefully. In the course of four or 
five years, then, the notebooks cannot fail to be of un- 
questioned value in forming habits of natural, thoughtful 
expression. 

The occasional papers in other courses, and the notebooks 
required in advanced classes in certain subjects, likewise 



88 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

receive care. I was especially impressed by the neatness 
and accuracy with which the students in the normal-school 
classes did all of their writing. I noticed, moreover, that 
many of the corrections on advanced papers had to do with 
the organization of the material and with smaller questions 
of clearness. Furthermore, I had the refreshing experience 
on a few occasions of seeing the teacher of civics, ethics, or 
philosophy call a seventeen-year-old boy to the floor, read 
from a paper he had submitted, and ask him what he really 
meant when he expressed himself in that manner. If the 
pupil then explained himself clearly, the teacher would 
demand why he did not make himself understood in the first 
place. And if the fault was inappropriateness rather than 
vagueness or obscurity, the criticism was scarcely less severe. 
In fact, whatever the prevailing faults of expression, there 
seemed to be no assurance for the pupil that the teacher 
would, by passing over them habitually, permit himself to 
undo the work of the teacher of composition and literature. 
The critical attitude toward all of the pupil's written work 
is maintained also toward his speech. This fact was brought 
to my notice in a striking manner the first time I visited a 
class in science. The pupils, most of them aged nine, were 
having a first lesson in geography. In the course of the 
discussion, the teacher asked one of the boys to describe a 
volcano. The little fellow said in his descriptive explana- 
tion that the volcano built a mountain of itself shaped 
" like this," indicating the cone-form with his hands. The 
teacher reprimanded him sharply for resorting to such a 
makeshift, and suggested that he be thoughtful enough in 
the future to express himself in words. If I had encountered 
no other cases, I might have thought this only the whim of 
an extremely sensitive teacher. But as I visited other 
classes in a variety of subjects, I came to see that most 



COMPOSITION 89 

French teachers have a well-developed conscience in respect 
to such matters. They do not drive a boy to abandon 
spontaneous speech, but they do insist that he make clear- 
cut, straightforward answers, and that they be phrased in 
reasonably acceptable language. 

VI. SUMMARY 

The attention, then, that the actual business of writing 
receives in the French schools is a matter not only of ade- 
quate instruction, but of full and definite practice under 
stimulating circumstances. Composition is held up as a 
very important part — in fact, the most important part — 
of the course in the mother tongue. Studies in vocabulary 
and practice in dictation are carried on constantly in the 
lower grades in order that the boy may express himself with- 
out hindrance when he is once old enough to have something 
of his own to say in organized compositions. The material 
assigned is regarded as a matter of great moment. It is in- 
tended to develop, in order, the powers of attention and 
observation, the imagination, and habits of reflection. This 
material, moreover, is almost invariably discussed in the 
classroom until the pupil is awakened and interested; and 
when he writes upon it, he must give the most thoughtful 
care to organization and general good form. In the criti- 
cism of themes, oral discussion holds a large place. Further- 
more, the teacher makes his critical suggestions distinctly 
constructive; that is, he emphasizes the difference between 
poor work and good, and he leads the pupils to reflect upon 
the possibilities that the subject-matter possesses, rather 
than upon the magnitude of their own shortcomings. And 
finally, the training that pupils receive in the study of the 
mother tongue is reenforced to no small degree by the work 
in other subjects. 



CHAPTER IV 

GRAMMAR 

Actual practice is the chief means by which the French 
boy learns to write; but it is not the sole means. It is only 
the center about which other good influences are built. In 
general, the French teacher is not afraid to give the boy a 
little supplementary, buttressing knowledge, whether or not 
it promises to be immediately " practical "; so he does not 
content himself to let the pupil grope along in his writing 
without some organized information concerning the lan- 
guage he attempts to employ. Grammar, therefore, is 
taught. And by grammar I do not mean predigested 
" language lessons," but real grammar that treats openly, 
and without apology, such principles as render language 
relations both intelligible and serviceable. The Instructions 
issued by the Minister make the general attitude toward 
the teaching of grammar unmistakably clear: " French is a 
living language which is known poorly if it is learned merely 
by usage. The study of grammar is, then, a necessity." 1 

I. THE PREDOMINANT PURPOSE IN TEACHING GRAMMAR 

The chief purpose in teaching grammar is nowise vague 
or pedagogically mysterious; it is to help the boy to gain a 
better working acquaintance with the language he speaks 
and writes. The value of grammatical exercises as training, 
as a means of developing the power to discriminate, to 
judge, is not disregarded or underestimated; but the chief 

1 Instructions, p. 72. 
90 



GRAMMAR 91 

aim is a mastery of the tools of everyday expression. Al- 
though it is not believed by anyone — so far as I was able 
to learn — that a knowledge of grammatical principles will 
inevitably lead one to speak or write correctly, it is gen- 
erally maintained that this knowledge, if acquired under 
favorable conditions, is of some definite value as a part of 
the pupil's equipment for effective expression. 

II. THE EARLY BEGINNING 

This definite purpose in teaching grammar goes far in 
determining when the pupil must begin its study. If gram- 
mar is to be of value at all to the pupil when he writes, so 
French teachers explain, he must study its elements while 
he is young, and he must master a few things so thoroughly 
that they cease to be mere knowledge and become habit and 
feeling. Instruction, therefore, begins early. The boy of six 
or seven is mastering the simpler tenses of etre (to be) and 
avoir (to have), and by the time he has reached the age of 
eight or nine, he is able to discuss the function of the differ- 
ent parts of speech and to talk in grammatical terms about 
the simpler forms of the sentence. As a rule, French 
teachers seem not to be proud of the distinction they have 
had in the past of being called the best grammarians in 
the world; they seem to feel that the compliment carries 
a suggestion that they are overnice about matters of usage. 
But they have not, as a consequence, been led from the 
belief that a little grammar is good for a boy's writing. They 
take the position that if a boy has anything to say, his 
ability to say it well must eventually depend in large meas- 
ure upon his skill in handling the sentence, and that this 
skill must come in part from deep-seated, long-established 
knowledge of sentence elements. If a boy is to resist the 
bad language influences of the street, he must have adequate 



92 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

knowledge with which to fortify the good habits that he 
forms at school or at home. Thus it comes to pass that the 
boy not only knows how to write a sentence, but he knows 
when he has written one, and he can think about it in terms 
that are immediately clear and that are serviceable to him 
in thinking about all other sentences. 

The advantage of beginning while the pupil is young does 
not end, however, with the early formation of good language 
habits. If boys and girls of thirteen or fourteen could form 
new habits or acquire new knowledge about language easily, 
there would still be a very good pedagogical reason why they 
should begin the study of grammar while they are young. 
When grammar is postponed until the boy is in the seventh 
or eighth grade, or possibly in the high school, he has come 
to look upon his studies as so many courses to take. Gram- 
mar, therefore, may readily seem to be some new subject as 
foreign to his everyday life as solid geometry or ancient 
history. And when grammar is for this reason dull and dry, 
nothing, it seems, could be duller or drier. The teacher, as 
well as the pupil, looks upon it as " formal grammar " or 
" technical grammar," and they unite in wishing it had 
never found its way into the school course. Now when a 
boy begins as soon as he enters school, and hears grammar 
and lessons in grammar always associated with writing, 
speaking, and reading, he accepts the study as a very natural 
part of his work in the mother tongue; and as his lessons 
become more substantial and more complex in the progress 
of his school career, he never arrives at the point where he is 
obliged to take up " the subject of grammar." Conse- 
quently he has no opportunity to feel that he is about to 
study something so obviously useless that he has been able 
to " get along " without it all these years. 



GRAMMAR 93 

III. SIMPLIFICATION 
The clearly conceived purpose of teaching grammar for 
its effect upon the pupil's expression, and the consequent 
belief that the study should begin early, explain in large 
degree the simplification of grammatical subject-matter 
and method that has been taking place in France recently. 
France, to a greater extent than America, passed through a 
period when grammar was a cumbersome, difficult subject. 
Yet French teachers seem to have agreed much more 
generally than Americans that the older formal grammar 
possessed real value, in spite of the fact that it was 
sometimes loaded down with many things either non- 
essential or positively injurious. In their reforms, then, 
instead of discarding grammar completely, or almost com- 
pletely, as was done in many states in our own country, they 
tried to eliminate the unimportant and the injurious and 
keep the valuable. As the strongly fortified traditions in 
grammar-teaching began to give way, educators came to see 
that though an endless array of close distinctions and ob- 
scure exceptions might serve to keep a boy at work and test 
his powers of endurance, a much simpler study might easily 
be of more value as a means of influencing speech and writ- 
ing. The process of simplification, assuredly, is not com- 
pleted; and the character of the French language makes it 
impossible to carry the process as far as it might be carried 
in English. Yet with comparatively few exceptions, French 
teachers approve what has been done and express the belief 
that many other changes might be brought about profitably. 

A. In Subject-Matter 

This simplification is noticeable, first, in the subject- 
matter taught. As was suggested in the preceding para- 
graph, the emphasis has been shifted. Instead of devoting 



94 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

much time to exercises in hair-splitting distinctions, the 
teacher dwells at great length upon a few principles that are 
easily understood and easily observed in everyday speech. 
The nature of the simple proposition, the functions of words 
in ordinary sentences, the most used tenses of familiar verbs, 
the complete conjugation of the regular verbs and some of 
the most frequently used irregular verbs, and the sequence 
of tenses, — these are the matters that are -dwelt upon 
throughout the earlier years of a pupil's school life. And 
when he enters upon the latter half of his course — if he 
continues his work as far as the baccalaureate or through 
the higher primary school — he is sure to have, in addition 
to his more detailed exercises in syntax, frequent reviews of 
what he has studied in the lower grades. After one has 
visited classes for several months, and has seen so much 
time devoted to these concentrated lessons, it is easy to 
understand why the French boy so rarely makes an egregious 
grammatical blunder after he is ten or twelve years of age. 
To be sure, French grammar-teaching was effective before 
the subject was simplified; but only in recent years has the 
good influence been stripped of a large part of its dead 
weight. 

B. In Classroom Exercises 

In the second place, the simplification has affected the 
processes of teaching. The emphasis in the presentation of 
the simplified subject-matter has been centered very largely 
in a few groups of comparatively simple exercises. Inas- 
much as the purpose seems to be always to have the pupil 
become trained in seeing the elements of a normal sentence 
without studious hesitation, these frequent exercises deal 
ordinarily with the simpler kind of structure. The pupil 
completes sentences by supplying omitted parts; he turns 
the plural words into singulars, or conversely; he changes 



GRAMMAR 95 

the masculine nouns into feminines, which in French neces- 
sitates many other changes; he substitutes pronouns for 
the nouns not only in one sentence, but in a series of sen- 
tences; he changes the tense (preserving the correct se- 
quence) of the verbs in a paragraph; he turns infinitive and 
participial constructions into finite verb constructions; he 
makes declarative sentences interrogative, an exercise which 
in French requires no little practice; he turns direct dis- 
course into indirect, and conversely; and he has almost con- 
stant practice in the simpler kinds of analysis. This analysis 
is well designed to give the pupil a firm hold on organi- 
zation and structure. It is not expressed by any scheme of 
diagramming — at least I did not see any such device used 
— and only the essential relations are treated. Usually 
when the teacher or pupil writes a sentence on the black- 
board, its construction is indicated in some such manner as 
follows : 

Since the Gauls had established their camp beyond the Anio, the 
Roman army departed from the city and halted on this side of the 
river. 

1. Since the Gauls had established Subordinate proposition 
their camp beyond the Anio 

2. the Roman army departed Principal proposition 
from the city 

3. and halted on this Principal proposition 
side of the river (Coordinate) 

And if the function of the individual words in the sentence 
is indicated in writing, it is in some equally simple manner. 
It is not difficult to see that regular practice in these fun- 
damental matters makes it almost certain that the pupil 
will be able to handle the sentence with readiness and sure- 
ness. He is exercised not only in the so-called mechanics of 
language, but in processes of thought; and the result is re- 
flected not merely in his ability to see the structure of what 
he reads, but in his power to visualize what he himself thinks. 



o6 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

C. In Nomenclature 

The simplification has recently been extended to gram- 
matical nomenclature. In France, as in America, there 
was formerly much confusion in the nomenclature employed 
in textbooks. Like us, the French teachers sought relief; 
but with more immediate success. Here is an instance 
where the close organization of the school system has made 
national reform a comparatively easy matter. When the 
Minister became convinced that action in respect to nomen- 
clature should be taken, he secured through his professional 
advisers and many of the best teachers of the mother tongue 
the most nearly satisfactory scheme possible. Then he 
issued an arrets (July, iqio) which set forth the terms 
adopted, and ordered that they be applied in examinations 
for the baccalaureate the year following. Immediately all 
the publishers in the country pasted green or red key-pages 
in their textbooks, and within a few months they were 
issuing editions bearing the words: " Revised according to 
the arrete concerning grammatical nomenclature." This 
change has been generally accepted as a long step in the 
direction of a satisfactory unification, it has wrought no 
great hardship, and it has necessitated no sacrifice of individ- 
uality. Authors of textbooks and teachers are at liberty 
to resort to as much ingenuity as they choose in treating the 
details of grammar, but there must be uniformity of name 
in all fundamental matters. The arrete has simply put into 
practice the common sense that if a brick is a brick, both 
Smith and Jones should call it that. The scheme, which we 
must remember was evolved for the French language, not 
ours, is printed below. 



GRAMMAR 



97 



THE PARTS OF SPEECH 

THE NOUN 
Classification of nouns 



f i. Proper nouns. 
' ' I 2. Common nouns (simple or compound). 



Number of nouns Singular — plural. 

Gender of nouns Masculine — feminine. 



THE ARTICLE 

Definite article. 
Classification of articles . ■{ 2. Indefinite article. 
3. Partitive article. 



■(: 



Classification of pronouns 



THE PRONOUN 

1. Personal and reflexive. 

2. Possessive. 

3. Demonstrative. 

4. Relative. 

5. Interrogative. 

6. Indefinite. 



Person and number of pronouns Singular — plural. 

Gender of pronouns Masculine — feminine — neuter. 

Case of pronouns Subject case — complement case. 

N.B. — By case is understood the forms that certain pronouns take 
according as they are subject or complement. 



THE ADJECTIVE 

Number Singular — plural. 

Gender Masculine — feminine. 



Classification 
of adjectives 



1. Qualifying adjectives 
(simple and compound) 



2. Numeral adjectives 

3. Possessive adjectives. 

4. Demonstrative adjectives. 

5. Interrogative adjectives. 

6. Indefinite adjectives. 



a. Comparative of equality. 

b. Comparative of superiority. 

c. Comparative of inferiority. 

d. Relative superlative. 

e. Absolute superlative. 

a. Ordinal. 

b. Cardinal. 



98 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 



THE VERB 

Verbs and verbal expressions. 
Number and person. 



Elements of the verb < 


,2. 


Root. 
Termination. 




Auxiliary verbs ..... Avoir (to have) — etre (lo be), etc. 


f 1 " 


Active. 


Forms of the verb . . \ 2. 


Passive. 


1 3- 


Pronominal. 




[ a. Indicative. 




b. Conditional. 




1. 


Personal moods . . 1 

c. Imperative. 


Moods of the verb . . < 




[ d. Subjunctive. 




2. 


, f a. Infinitive. 
Impersonal moods < . ^ .... 
1 b. Participle. 




1. 


The present. 








a. The imperfect. 








b. The simple past — 


Tenses of the verb . . 


2. 


The past • 


the compound past. 

c. The past anterior. 

d. The pluperfect. 




3- 


_,. , ^ (a. Simple future. 

The future < , _, ./ 

1 b. r uture anterior. 


Impersonal verbs. 






CONJUGATION 


The verbs of the active form are ranged in three groups: 


1. Verbs of the type of 


aimer: the present in e. 


2. Verbs of the type of finir \ ,_. . , . '. 

{ participle in tssant. 


3. All other verbs. 









WORDS INVARIABLE IN FORM 

Adverbs and adverbial expressions. 
Prepositions and prepositional expressions. 
Conjunctions and con- ( 1. Conjunctions of coordination, 
junctional expressions I 2. Conjunctions of subordination. 
Interjections. 



GRAMMAR 99 



Uses of the noun 



SYNTAX 

THE PROPOSITION 

ii. Subject. 
I Attribute. 
4. Complement. 
Subject. 
Appositive. 
Attribute. 
( 4. Complement. 

,. ( 1. Epithet. 

Uses of the adjective . . . < . ;. , t . 
' I 2. Attribute. 

THE COMPLEMENTS 

Nearly all words may have complements. They are: 

1. Complements of the noun. 

2. Complements of the adjective. 

3. Complements of the verb: complements direct and indirect. 

CLASSIFICATION OF PROPOSITIONS 

1. Independent propositions. 

2. Principal propositions. 

3. Subordinate propositions. 

N.B. — Either principal or subordinate propositions may be coordinate. 

_ . . , , . . { 1. Subject proposition. 

Propositions may have functions analo- . 

*\ >, , . , „, 2. Appositive proposition, 

gous to the functions of nouns. They \ . „ . ... 

3. Attributive proposition. 

y [4. Complementary proposition. 

IV. THE CLOSE RELATION OF GRAMMAR TO OTHER WORK 

The simplification of grammar, important as it must be, 
is not, however, the most essential or the most significant 
part of present-day teaching in France. It is quite possible 
for grammar to be simple in every respect, yet be so far 
removed from a boy's life that he finds no value in the sim- 
plification. In providing against such a possible defect, the 
French teacher has made probably his greatest contribution 
to the teaching of the subject. Grammar is not taught as a 



ioo HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

thing apart. The pupil is made to feel that the subject is 
vitally related to his other studies, to his writing, to his 
everyday speech, — in fact, to his whole intellectual life. In 
this manner, grammar is robbed of its chief terrors and is 
made to hold a very normal place in a boy's pursuits. 

A. Through the Internal Arrangement of 
Class Periods 

Evidence of this close relation is first seen in the internal 
arrangement of class periods devoted to the mother tongue. 
I did not see one recitation in grammar that extended be- 
yond fifteen or twenty minutes. It seems to be taken for 
granted everywhere that a normal boy cannot survive a very 
long lesson in grammar. Consequently, he is led through 
an active, stimulating exercise lasting only a quarter of an 
hour, and then his attention is directed to something else. 
Not only does this kind of lesson prevent grammar itself 
from becoming dull, but it enables the teacher to relate 
grammatical principles to whatever other studies in the 
mother tongue he may take up for the remainder of the hour. 
Whether the pupils read an author, write a theme, or criti- 
cise themes read to them, there is much opportunity for 
the teacher to say, " There is an instance of the very 
thing we were talking about "; or " In this case, some other 
grammatical construction would have been acceptable"; 
or " You see what that writer did when he was confronted 
with that difficulty." 

There appears to be no rigidly established order of the 
different parts of a recitation that includes grammar, but 
from the notes I made while visiting classes it would seem 
that most teachers have the lesson in grammar at the be- 
ginning of the hour. This arrangement is well justified, not 
only because the pupils are fresh from a period of recreation, 



GRAMMAR 101 

but also because the grammar is thus related to the re- 
mainder of the recitation with greater ease than if it came 
after the reading or composition. Perhaps I ought to ex- 
plain that the meeting-points do not necessarily grow out of 
premeditation; the teacher's comments in many cases are 
only the thought of the moment. But the simple fact that 
he is provided with an opportunity to point out examples of 
grammatical principles so recently discussed makes such a 
division of the hour seem much more fruitful than a full hour 
of grammar once a week. The following plans of an hour's 
recitation are typical : 1 

(i) (a) The grammatical analysis (for verbs) of about twenty lines 
of good French prose. 

(b) The reading of one of Prudhomme's poems. In the dis- 
cussion of the literary qualities of this poem, the teacher 
explained two grammatical problems. 

(c) The reading of a pleasant story by the teacher, — an 
exercise which the pupils enjoyed thoroughly. 

(2) (a) The study of a poem assigned two days before. 

(&) A lesson in grammar on the agreement of the pronoun and 

past participle, 
(c) The preliminary explanation of the reading lesson that is 

to be studied in class a day or two later. 

(3) (a) The grammatical analysis of ten lines of prose. 

(b) The recitation, from memory, of one of La Fontaine's 
Fables. 

(c) The reading and criticising of written exercises that the 
teacher had graded. 

(4) (a) A short lesson in the textbook on grammar; then the study 

of two or three sentences that presented characteristic 
difficulties. 

(b) The recitation of Andre Chenier's La Jeune Captive. 

(c) The reading and study of two selections in prose that dealt 
with the same period of the Revolution. 

1 Printed as I recorded them in notes made in the classroom. 



102 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

B. Through Oral Exercises 

The lessons in grammar are brought close to a boy's life, 
too, by the fact that they are almost exclusively oral. The 
teacher sometimes records in detail on the blackboard the 
recitation the pupils make, but the pupils themselves rarely 
ever write; they must define, discuss, and analyze orally. 
A number of reasons are offered for this practice. One is 
that it enables the class to cover more ground than would be 
possible if the recitation were written. Another is that a 
pupil ought to think more rapidly in analyzing sentences 
than he possibly can do in writing out the analysis. Still 
another is that since a pupil normally speaks so much more 
than he writes, most of the practice should be in speaking. 
But the greatest reason seems to be that an oral recitation is 
full of activity. In every subject taught in the elementary 
schools, activity is constantly encouraged. Teachers try 
to make a pupil's knowledge an inseparable part of him- 
self. And in the study of grammar this theory seems to 
be put into practice with more than usual effect. When the 
boy is alert and closely intent on the matter in hand, all 
impressions are sure to be deeper and consequently more 
permanent than if he were laboriously writing out relations 
which he can see in an instant but which he must hold 
in mind while he writes out an entire sentence, or even 
two or three. In speaking or in writing down one's thoughts, 
one must feel grammatical relations immediately. There 
must be no delay to annoy a hearer or to permit the evasive 
spirit of thought to steal from the writer's mind. The 
grammar must be a part of the thought itself. To bring a 
pupil into such a condition of mind requires just the kind of 
instantaneous thinking that he is obliged to do in well- 
planned exercises that are almost exclusively oral. 



GRAMMAR 103 

C. Through the Use of Complete Passages 
op Prose 

The grammar lesson itself is usually based upon some 
more or less complete passage of prose that is drawn from 
the boy's reading. He is not, then, tempted to believe that 
grammar is something that has to do only with special sen- 
tences chosen to fit into a textbook. He sees that a passage 
which has interest and charm as literature is at the same 
time subject to grammatical laws, and often cannot be com- 
pletely comprehended without the application of these laws. 

It is needless to say that the passage intended for the 
grammar lesson proper must be selected with care. It is 
not full of technical difficulties that might draw a pupil 
away from the real center of the lesson; and it is chosen for 
the immediate appeal that the subject-matter ought to 
make. Here, as in the giving of dictations, the first duty 
of the teacher is to ascertain that the pupils compre- 
hend. He reads the passage for a given lesson, explains it 
fully, and helps every boy not only to understand but to 
appreciate. Let me give an example. In a typical reci- 
tation that I visited, the teacher wrote on the blackboard 
during intermission the following passage from Daudet: 

Poor Man! 

It was in honor of this last recitation that he had put on his good 
Sunday clothes. And now I understood why those old people from 
the village were sitting there at the end of the room. It all seemed 
to say that they were sorry not to have come oftener to this school. 
It was also a way of thanking the teacher for his forty years of good 
service, and of showing their respect for the fatherland which, was 
slipping away. 1 

When the class — a class of nine-year-old boys — were in 
their seats ready for the recitation, the teacher read the 

1 Translated from La demiere classe. 



104 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

paragraph through. Then he called upon several boys in 
turn to read. Inasmuch as the class had been reading 
Daudet in some of their lessons, they were immediately 
interested in this passage, and the boys who read aloud 
showed by the intelligence and spirit of their reading that 
they understood and enjoyed all the writer said. Next the 
teacher called upon several boys to explain the least familiar 
words, so that no one in the class might have only a vague 
or indefinite understanding of the paragraph. In every 
instance he insisted that the definition be complete and 
exact. After this preliminary study, the teacher took up 
the lesson in grammar. To begin with, he called for all the 
nouns in the paragraph. This, of course, for boys who had 
already received instruction in grammar, even though they 
were only nine years old, was an easy task. Then he called 
for the adjectives, and as the boys indicated them, he under- 
scored them on the blackboard. Finally, he and the pupils 
talked simply and familiarly about the verbs and the sub- 
jects of the sentences. It was not difficult to see that the 
pupils understood, and that they understood in terms of 
grammar. Yet in the entire twenty minutes of recita- 
tion — the rest of the hour was devoted to dictation and 
reading — there was not the slightest suggestion of over- 
technical phraseology or disagreeable abstractions; there 
was nothing to lead the pupil to believe that grammar was 
a thing apart. 

To be sure, exercises of this kind vary according to the age 
of the pupils, the teacher's preferences, the character of the 
particular passage chosen for study, and the nature of the 
work that is to occupy the class during the remainder of 
the hour. Sometimes, too, the teacher modifies or withholds 
some part of the text so that the purpose of the lesson may 
stand out clearly. For example, when one teacher dictated 



GRAMMAR 105 

a passage from a translation of Franklin's Autobiography, 1 
he gave the pupils only the infinitive form of the verbs, and 
then asked them to study and master, as a part of their next 
day's lesson, certain tenses in the conjugation of these verbs. 
The original text will serve to show the chief purpose of this 
assignment: 

There was a salt-marsh that bounded part of the millpond, on the 
edge of which, at high water, we used to stand and fish for minnows. 
By much trampling, we had made it a mere quagmire. My proposal 
was to build a wharf there fit for us to stand upon, and I showed my 
comrades a large heap of stones, which were intended for a new house 
near the marsh, and which would very well suit our purpose. Accord- 
ingly, in the evening, when the workmen were gone, I assembled a 
number of my playfellows, and working with them diligently like so 
many emmets, sometimes two or three to a stone, we brought them all 
away and built our little wharf. The next morning the workmen were 
surprised at missing the stones, which were found in our wharf. 
Inquiry was made after the removers; we were discovered and com- 
plained of; several of us were corrected by our fathers; and though I 
pleaded the usefulness of the work, mine convinced me that nothing was 
useful which was not honest. 

But it mattered not how a passage was treated in a given 
instance, it was always put into its original form before the 
end of the lesson. There was no effort to revise literature 
simply " to make it parse." The pupils were always re- 
minded that, after all, they were dealing with a piece of good 
literature and not a cut-to-order grammar lesson. 

One objection might be made to this method; namely, 
that it injures or kills the boy's interest in literature. 
We have heard much in recent years about the criminal 
conduct of the teacher who dares to discuss the so-called 
mechanics of a good piece of prose; we are told that to talk 
about the grammar of a passage from Stevenson or Ruskin 
or Newman is " literary murder." But why ? Does the 
artist, even the least effective artist, see less in the great 

1 Franklin's Autobiography is widely used in the French schools. 



106 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

picture because he knows technique and structure, and 
speaks in terms of his art ? Does the playwright or the 
architect see less in the play or the public building because 
he has found it possible to " reconcile technique with 
emotion" ? Neither reason nor experience can give an 
affirmative reply. In truth, the French teacher seems to 
increase the boy's interest distinctly by helping him to see 
the structure of what he reads. And why should he not ? 
Perhaps everyone who reads this paragraph knows of 
teachers who spend long months in saying that the structure 
or the language of a piece is beautiful, and contributes, 
therefore, to the beauty of the subject-matter, yet who do 
not help a pupil to enough knowledge of language to enable 
him to distinguish one kind of effect from another. He 
does not know that the infinitive construction is character- 
istically loose, for example, because he does not recognize an 
infinitive construction when he sees it; he does not note the 
effects of grammatical inversion because — sad to relate — 
he cannot tell whether a sentence is inverted or not. Gram- 
mar, it must be admitted, may, like other sciences, be so 
poorly taught that everything it touches will be blighted. 
But, on the other hand, if the subject-matter is in itself 
interesting, and if the teacher uses good judgment in 
stopping short of overminute distinctions, a pupil's knowl- 
edge of the structure of a passage must inevitably contribute 
to a more intelligent appreciation. 

D. Through Emphasis on the Sentence 

The relation of the grammar lesson to the boy's reading 
and speaking is made firmer by the fact that in all the exer- 
cises beyond the very first ones in the beginning classes, the 
sentence, rather than any smaller element, is the unit of 
study. The parts of speech are not neglected, but the 



GRAMMAR 107 

emphasis is so unmistakably fixed on the sentence that the 
pupil is in little danger of regarding the parts of speech as 
anything more than " parts." In analysis, which includes 
what we call parsing, the exercises are so shorn of unneces- 
sary searching for fine distinctions, and in other respects are 
so simplified, that the importance of the sentence as a unit 
is sure to stand out predominantly. And even in the study 
of conjugations, the sentence seems always to be kept in the 
forefront. Pupils almost invariably recited : 

We have our umbrellas under our arms. 
You have your umbrellas under your arms. 
They have their umbrellas under their arms. 

Or they employed a compound sentence: 

We saw the danger and warned our brother. 1 
You saw the danger and warned your brother. 
They saw the danger and warned their brother. 

This kind of conjugation, it might be said in passing, is 
regularly employed, too, in the classes in English. It must 
account in no small measure for the French boy's ability to 
use such English verbs as sit and set and lie and lay with sur- 
prising accuracy. In any event, it contributes to his feeling 
that in all language study the sentence is the grammatical 
unit of greatest importance. 

V. THE INFLUENCE OF THE INDUCTIVE METHOD 

The dominant purpose in teaching grammar, that is, to 
give it permanent, practical value for the pupil in all his 
language study and in his speech and writing, is partly the 
result but chiefly the cause of one pronounced tendency in 
classroom method. From what we may have heard of the 
characteristics of the French education of three or four 
decades ago, or from current notions of the importance of 

1 The English, of course, does not show the verb changes of the French. 



108 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

such a body as the French Academy, it might be inferred 
that the teaching of a subject like grammar would be by 
means of ironclad rule. Such, however, is not the case. 
Everywhere there is a tendency to get farther and farther 
away from the arbitrary and take what we in America have 
chosen to call the " scientific attitude." The study of the 
mother tongue, it is maintained, should be in very large 
part the observation of language phenomena. Thus the 
inductive method has grown steadily into the teaching of 
grammar, and at present there is much discussion of the ad- 
visability of extending it still farther. The extreme position 
of a method that is wholly inductive is maintained by some 
teachers, notably Professor Brunot, of the Sorbonne. He 
sums up his argument in the following words: " Language 
is a social fact: like all social phenomena, it is the product of 
the past. . . . Language is not a deliberate, premeditated 
creation: grammar is not a form of logic but a science of 
observation, which ought tb spring from inductions and 
not deductions." x On account of Professor Brunot's 
scholarship, and the fact that he is one of the authors of a 
well-known series of textbooks for schools, 2 his expression of 
belief has received serious consideration; and his views 
have contributed materially to the progress of induction. 

It seems to be more generally believed, however, that 
though the inductive method is the only acceptable method 
in language investigation and the establishment of the laws 
of grammar, it is not practicable in the classroom when 
adopted in its entirety. To begin with, it is regarded as too 
unwieldy. Again, it consumes entirely too much time. If 
a pupil is to follow the direction of his teacher in making one 

1 U Enseignement de la Langue franqaise, pp. 51 f. 

2 Brunot et Bony, Methode de Langue franqaise. Librairie Armand 
Colin. 



GRAMMAR 109 

observation, then another, and another, until he finally 
arrives at a conclusion or principle, he must of necessity 
leave many important grammatical questions untouched 
simply because he has not time enough. Then a third 
objection is offered. It is maintained that the purely in- 
ductive method is unnecessary; that a modified form is 
really more effective in the practical work of the recitation. 
The value of induction is not underestimated, but accord- 
ing to those who hold this last view — and they are many — 
it should be used only to keep the pupil aware that the 
principles he studies are based on real usage; that is, in- 
duction should be employed in combination with deduction. 
Thus it comes about that one sees in the schools a certain 
amount of textbook study combined with a greater amount 
of direct observation of the language as it is used; and that 
in a given classroom when the teacher is trying to fix a 
definition or a principle in the pupil's mind, he begins with 
an example, next explains the definition, and then concludes 
with another example. 1 In this manner the boy is made to 
see the justification of the definition or principle, and the 
teacher saves much of the time that the purely inductive 
method would consume. 

All in all, the influence of the inductive method has 
served to relate grammatical study to the pupil's entire life. 
Moreover, it has clarified and rendered intelligent, in a 
score of different ways, the attitude of teacher and pupil 
toward grammatical problems. The observation of lan- 
guage phenomena has led the teacher to see that he must 
not be dogmatic in questions of disputed usage. It has led 
him, too, to take an intelligent view of exceptions. His 
pupils, as a result, come to understand the relation of ex- 
ceptions to rules in a living language. They see that the 

1 This method is prescribed for secondary schools. See Instructions, p. 72. 



no HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

rules are not instruments of torture, but conveniences that 
have been derived from language as it lives and grows. The 
teacher finds, too, that emphasis should be placed upon the 
observation of idioms. One of the most interesting classes 
I visited was that of a teacher who was explaining to boys 
of ten or eleven in the most illuminating manner that some 
of the expressions in the lesson could not be taken apart in 
the process of analysis, but that they must be considered as 
little units in themselves. Then he showed that every lan- 
guage has its own peculiar turns of phrase, and gave some 
good examples of Gallicisms, Anglicisms, and Latinisms. 
I saw many recitations in which similar explanations were 
made. In many ways, then, the pupils of the present gen- 
eration in France have profited by the inductive method. 
Their attitude toward living language is distinctly more in- 
telligent and more tolerant. 

VI. HISTORICAL GRAMMAR 

The instruction in the grammar of present-day usage 
continues regularly until the boy is thirteen, fourteen, or 
fifteen years of age. He then has regular reviews in the 
subject until he leaves the lycee or the higher primary school 
at the age of seventeen or eighteen. In addition to all this 
work, the pupil receives instruction in the field of historical 
grammar. The directions of the Minister read: 

" In the course of this review, he [the teacher] will com- 
pare the syntax of present-day French with that of the 
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. On this point it 
would be well to recall the words of the programme of 
studies: ' The teacher will give, during the reading of the 
texts, such elements of historical grammar as may seem 
necessary. These elements are not to constitute the 
material of a regular course, and are to be given only in so 



GRAMMAR in 

far as they contribute to a more intelligent understanding 
of the present-day usage of the language.' " 1 

These directions indicate with reasonable accuracy the 
scope of this work and the method employed in the class- 
room. It should be borne in mind that the instruction does 
not constitute a course in itself, yet it must not be under- 
stood that the demands on the teacher are slight. In fact, 
he must have a sounder training, more abundant pedagogi- 
cal skill, and a more discriminating sense of fitness than if 
he were giving a fixed course ; for he must make his obser- 
vations and his explanations so opportune that the pupil 
will immediately feel their relevancy and force. The read- 
ing of Moliere, Racine, or even La Fontaine is certain to 
bring up questions that will require the explanation of a great 
variety of grammatical changes that have taken place be- 
tween the time of the author under consideration and the 
present. Perhaps it will seem advisable, moreover, to look 
backward as well as forward from that time. Then the 
simple question that some boy asks about an accent over a 
letter in a word is sufficient reason for explaining how it 
came to be there and over many other letters that represent 
the same changes. To judge whether the explanation that 
a given case of this kind demands should be offered in a 
sentence or in a five or ten minute discussion requires not 
only scholarship but " pedagogical sense." 

It scarcely need be said that the instruction is elementary 
in character. Boys of fourteen, fifteen, or sixteen, even if 
they have had good training in the grammar of present-day 
usage, do not go very deeply into historical grammar. In 
America, where historical grammar is usually associated 
with the graduate school of the university, we are likely to 
think it quite impossible for mere schoolboys to pursue its 

1 Instructions, p. 77. 



ii2 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

study with any degree of profit whatever. And it must be 
admitted that the young boy cannot go far. Yet, when one 
visits a large number of classrooms where instruction of this 
kind is given, one cannot fail to see that the pupils are really 
gaining knowledge that is of considerable importance. By 
the time a boy leaves the lycee he has learned something of 
the life of words, of roots, of affixes, of radicals, of tonic 
accent, of simple words, of derived words, of compound 
words; he has become acquainted with the linguistic sig- 
nificance of the Roman invasion, and he has had an oppor- 
tunity to see how doublets have come into the language; he 
has discovered some of the distinguishing marks of popular 
and learned origins ; he has gained at least some information 
about the dialects in the older French; he has observed the 
changes that the pronouns have undergone since the days 
when Latin was a spoken language; he has observed the 
importance of the auxiliaries and the conditional in French; 
and he has been asked to note scores of changes — perhaps 
each slight in itself — that have taken place within the 
past two centuries. 1 

The value of the study can scarcely be doubted. First 
of all, it gives the pupil a language background. He has 
some knowledge of the past; and if the study has served 
only to acquaint him with the fact that there has been a 
past in language, his time has been well spent. But there 
are other and greater values. It gives him a just notion of 
the nature of language. After he has received some in- 
struction of this kind, he cannot look upon language as a 
thing that is fixed and unchangeable. He sees, on every 
hand, that changes have taken place and are always taking 
place. Thus for him, grammar is no longer a collection of 

1 Some of the textbooks on present-day grammar include brief accounts 
of the growth of the language. 



GRAMMAR 113 

dogmatic rules, but a body of principles and practices that 
may appeal to common sense. Furthermore, a great many 
matters that, perchance, have perplexed him from his 
earliest youth are now made clear. And finally, the study 
arouses a healthy curiosity about language problems. 
Pupils come to see that the history of a language may be 
almost as interesting as the history of the people with whose 
life it is closely interwoven. Thus they are led to observe; 
and as they observe, the grammar of everyday speech be- 
comes more interesting and more obviously worth while. 



CHAPTER V 
READING AND LITERATURE 

A further explanation of the French boy's ability to write 
is to be found in the kind of material he reads and the 
manner in which reading is done. It is not my purpose to 
take up all the influences that reading may have on one's 
style; they may be many or few. Neither do I wish to 
enter into a discussion of the subtle questions of pedagogy 
that trouble the primary teacher. I shall endeavor, in- 
stead, to point out some of the large characteristics of 
French method and show how these are meant to increase 
the boy's power of expression. We shall see what he reads, 
how he reads, and the condition of mind in which his read- 
ing and other exercises based on literature must almost in- 
evitably leave him. 

I. WHAT THE PUPIL READS 

From the very first years of a boy's school life, the ma- 
terial he reads is of sound literary merit. The books of 
selections — not " readers " in our sense of the word — 
include the chief names in French literature, as well as a 
great many other authors that are at least favorably known. 
Every boy of nine or ten has read something from Daudet; 
and although his writings are extremely interesting to 
adults, the boy appreciates him genuinely. Then every 
pupil reads Victor Hugo, who in France is known as a poet 
rather than a prose writer, and he becomes acquainted with 
La Bruyere, Boileau, Chateaubriand, Joseph de Maistre, 
Lamartine, Michelet, Leconte de Lisle, Andre Theuriet, 
Flaubert, Vigny, Franklin (in translation), and such 



READING AND LITERATURE 115 

present-day writers as Pierre Loti and Charles Wagner. 
Above all, he lives in the atmosphere of La Fontaine, whose 
Fables are exceptionally well designed for reading material, 
since they express in admirable form a kind of subject- 
matter that makes a strong appeal to boys of nine, ten, 
eleven, or twelve. In these authors, together with the many 
others that are drawn upon, may be found all the variety 
that the youthful mind demands. 

The argument in favor of early readings from " good 
literature " is twofold. It is pointed out, first, that the 
practice saves the boy many months of valuable time in his 
school career. Why should he spend a considerable part of 
the best period of his life in learning to read by means of 
made-to-order lessons, when he might as easily, or more 
easily, learn by reading something of permanent value? 
Secondly, this good literature may be just as easy to under- 
stand as pieces that have been specially prepared for the 
reading-book. In truth, comprehension is frequently aided 
in large measure by the simplicity of structure and the artis- 
tic perfection that characterizes the best writing. It follows, 
then, that the pupil not only gains in time, but derives a 
greater pleasure, and a deeper, more abiding satisfaction 
than he could possibly derive from something childishly 
mediocre or intellectually cheap. 

To the American teacher, another great advantage in this 
early reading of good authors should be evident. The 
French boy does not come to the time when he puts aside 
light reading and takes up the study of College Entrance 
Requirements or books that are labeled with some other 
formidable name. He is not brought to look upon the study 
of literature as something new and strange — as so much 
new ground to cover — for after he has once entered upon 
his school career he never arrives at the place where he 



n6 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

" begins to study literature." In the later years of his 
course, when he studies essays, fiction, drama, and poetry, 
he is only doing on a larger scale what he has done more or 
less perfectly since he first learned to read. The advanced 
books of selections that are obligatory in the upper grades 
are drawn in large part from the authors included in the 
more elementary books. The difference is only in the 
degree of maturity required in the pupil; the general char- 
acter of the material is the same. And because it is the 
same, the pupil is prevented from experiencing any " transi- 
tion " into a wholly new kind of literary study. 

One question may very naturally arise : Is this reading- 
matter always morally wholesome in tone ? Current 
American notions of French literature make it easy for one 
to imagine that French boys and girls might be asked to 
occupy themselves with material that is either characterless 
or positively sordid. But all in all, I believe the French 
teacher's conscience is just as sensitive in this respect as the 
American teacher's. 1 It is true that we sometimes point 
with disgust to a certain kind of vicious literary " art " that 
is called French; but it is just as true that French men and 
women of the better sort find it equally repulsive. It 
should be borne in mind, moreover, that the French people 
as a race seem to hold steadfastly to the belief that a piece 
of literature may be quite harmless or even severely moral 
for adults, yet wholly pernicious and immoral for young 
boys and girls. It has sometimes seemed to me that this 

1 He is, moreover, becoming interested in American literature. Every- 
where I went I asked teachers, pupils, and other persons what American 
authors they knew. Longfellow, Poe, and Emerson were the favorites. 
Some mentioned Hawthorne and Whitman, and schoolboys frequently spoke 
of Cooper and Franklin. Many mature men mentioned William James 
with the deepest respect; and one aged student of philosophy went so far 
as to declare him the most important writer of the nineteenth century. 



READING AND LITERATURE 117 

attitude served as a pretext for the production of an abun- 
dance of literary filth. But the fact remains that the 
young are protected from unwholesome reading in the 
schools. There is much in French literature that is clean, 
much that is intensely patriotic, much that is full of inspi- 
ration for youth; and it is upon readings of some of these 
kinds that the schoolboy is brought up. 

The literary excellence of the young boy's reading ex- 
tends to what he reads outside of school hours, although the 
degree to which he profits over the American boy in this 
respect is scarcely open to demonstration. He is busier in 
school than the American boy because of the greater number 
of school hours a week, and he has not, therefore, so much 
occasion to go outside the field of school reading for mental 
occupation. Furthermore, the fact that his parents in their 
youth read good literature and that he himself has read 
nothing else in school is almost certain to have influenced 
his taste to some degree ; so that, all in all, he is less likely 
to be hungering after the cheap and the tawdry. Then, 
too, many of the plays that are presented in the theatres 
emphasize the importance of high literary standards. 
Through all the dramatic fashions of the past two or three 
decades, some of the French theatres have continued to 
give a number of classic plays every month. And at such 
a theatre as the Odeon x in Paris, which is subsidized by 
the government, one may, especially by subscribing to an 
agency, secure certain good seats at relatively low prices. 

1 Between 1906 and 1914, two hundred and thirty different plays were 
presented at the Odeon. Although some of these were only what might be 
called good drama, a large per cent of them were classics. More new plays 
are presented now than formerly, but the classics still hold large place. 
For a study of the plays presented at the Comedie-Francaise from 1840 to 
1902, see pp. 3 ff. of L'Enseignement du franqais, by Lanson and others. 
1909. Imprimerie Nationale. 



n8 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

Sometimes, too, the play that is given on the afternoon of 
Thursday — the school holiday in France — is preceded by 
a lecture on the play and the author. Teachers lament 
that the theatre is less influential in support of French 
literature than it was formerly; but a certain type of 
theatre must still be included with home reading as one 
of the " outside " forces contributing to literary taste. 

It may be said, then, that the whole influence of what the 
boy reads in school and much that he reads outside, espe- 
cially at home, is toward better expression on his own part. 
He is, of course, all this while subject to the influences of the 
street, the cheap newspaper, and the third-class theatre; 
but these influences are not permitted to remain operative 
to the exclusion of every other. His reading makes it 
obligatory that he live a part of the time in an atmosphere 
that counteracts the effect of the incorrect, the careless, or 
the vicious language of those whose lives, through bad for- 
tune, touch his intimately. 

H. HOW THE PUPIL READS 

French recitations in reading, whatever one may say 
about this or that individual device, are remarkable because 
of the alertness of mind they cultivate. Activity is their 
essential characteristic. The pupil, it is maintained, must 
profit chiefly by catching the full meaning of an assignment, 
by seeing below the surface, by reflecting upon the beauty 
or the strength that may not be evident at first to his im- 
mature, restless mind. He must, then, be kept active, 
body and soul, and impressions must be made while he is 
thus active and consequently receptive. In this theory 
there is, to be sure, nothing that is novel. But when it is 
faithfully carried into practice year after year, it cannot fail 
to leave a distinct impress upon a boy's life. 



READING AND LITERATURE 119 

A. In the Lower Grades 

The reading lesson in the earlier grades falls readily into 
two parts; namely, gaining a thorough understanding of the 
text that is to be read, and coming to an appreciation of it 
by reading it aloud. It cannot be looked upon as we regard 
a reading lesson from a " reader ", for the time is not de- 
voted exclusively, or even in greater part, to the practice of 
reading orally. The oral reading is the culmination of the 
exercise, but it is dependent for its greatest efficacy upon the 
prehminary analysis and discussion of the text. 

This prehminary discussion is based on the conviction 
that a boy should never be required to read orally anything 
he does not fully understand. The Instructions of the 
Minister insist that this conviction is well founded; and the 
daily exercises in the classroom make it clear that the 
Minister only expresses the general attitude. The discus- 
sion, it should be borne in mind, is not simply the bit of cau- 
tion or suggestion that any self-respecting teacher anywhere 
would regard as necessary, but an exacting exercise in itself. 
Thus, for example, the reading lesson for Friday is first dis- 
cussed in a general way by the teacher at the end of the 
recitation on Wednesday. He points out some of the diffi- 
culties without clearing them away, he asks about the 
meaning of words that he is certain are not familiar to the 
pupils, and he makes many suggestions about the best 
means of preparing the lesson. Then on Friday morning, 
perhaps after a short exercise in grammar, the earlier part 
of the hour is devoted to a more thorough-going discussion 
of the troublesome passages of the text. Even in the earlier 
grades the teacher carries on a campaign of questioning and 
explanation so exacting that the boys must exercise their 
observation and reasoning powers to the utmost in order to 



120 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

pass through the exercise successfully. At first it seems 
like an unnecessarily rigid ordeal for the little fellows, and 
the American youth would undoubtedly resent it as an 
encroachment upon his liberty of following the line of least 
resistance; but as one sees the exercise from day to day 
and observes the discriminating mind that it develops, one 
cannot deny its powerful influence on a boy's oral reading 
and his ultimate ability to express himself intelligently. 

In a given instance, the teacher must, of course, select 
judiciously the matters to be considered; but the discussion 
may include almost anything that is relevant. There is no 
ironclad routine. The meanings of individual words, the 
opposites of words, the spelling of an occasional word that 
might easily be misspelled or mispronounced, the length 
of the verses of poetry and the sentences of prose, the 
grammatical constructions that are likely to affect one's oral 
reading, the meaning of individual sentences, and above all, 
both at the beginning and end of the discussion, the general 
meaning of the selection read; — these are the matters one 
is sure to hear discussed. Frequently, too, before the oral 
reading, the teacher calls upon some boy to give the content 
of the lesson in his own words. This practice has, of course, 
the general value of training a boy in straightforward speech 
and of increasing his working vocabulary; but its imme- 
diate purpose is to assure the teacher that the pupil has 
understood accurately. Only after thorough study of this 
kind is the final reading taken up. 

How does training of this kind affect the pupil's oral 
reading ? It is difficult to make generalizations that are in 
all respects sound, yet one may say safely that the French 
boy reads well. In the first place, he reads correctly. He 
is exceedingly accurate and distinct in his pronunciation, he 
does not habitually leave out words, and he cannot be said 



READING AND LITERATURE 121 

to " read in " many words that are not there. Again, he 
expresses himself in a good, clear voice. In the entire year 
I heard only a. few cases of faltering or mumbling, and in 
these instances the teacher's severe criticism led me to be- 
lieve the fault unusual. In general it seems to be thought 
that a boy had better make a clear-cut misreading and have 
it corrected, than to falter and hesitate, even though he 
should in the latter instance chance to get through the para- 
graph or poem without making any gross blunders. Then 
again, the reading impresses one as being natural. There 
is little of the so-called expressive reading that elocutionists 
cultivate for the purpose of proving their versatility. The 
one aim is to express an honest interpretation. The boy 
has adequate knowledge of what he reads, and in the con- 
sciousness of this knowledge he can combine abandon and 
fitness. Thus it comes about that the spirit as well as the 
form of the reading is good. Pupils read as if they were 
putting all their intelligence and all their best spirit into the 
task. Their characteristic French naivete seems to prevent 
them from ever suspecting that anybody might laugh at 
their enthusiasm or their fidelity in expressing sentiment. 

Good reading of this kind perpetuates itself. If boys 
hear their classmates reading well every day, and know 
themselves how to read well, they will enjoy the exercise; 
and French boys do enjoy it. They are eager to read and 
eager to listen. If a classmate does not read convincingly, 
they criticise him sharply; if he succeeds especially well, 
they reveal the utmost respect for his ability. This appar- 
ent hazard in the exercise seems to increase rather than 
diminish a pupil's willingness to try his skill. 

To the interest which the pupils themselves create must 
be added that which is perpetuated by the teacher's own 
example. When, toward the end of a recitation, after the 



122 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

pupils have read, the teacher reads the lesson himself, there 
is usually rapt attention. And when he volunteers to read 
a short story or a poem that is not in the day's assignment, 
there is frequently much noisy enthusiasm. The first 
reading of this kind that I heard will always remain vividly 
in my memory. It was in a primary school in Paris. The 
class had been discussing the Revolution, and the teacher, a 
gray-headed, gray-bearded man of fifty-four years, had 
explained the tremendous losses that the world had suffered 
because of the Terror. Then he told how, according to 
tradition, the poets Andre Chenier and Roucher had been 
led to the guillotine together. Turning to the little book- 
case behind his desk, he took from it a volume that con- 
tained Chenier's La Jeune Captive. After he had explained 
that Chenier had written this poem while he was imprisoned 
at St. Lazare, he read it simply and with feeling. The little 
boys of twelve, with their elbows on their desks and their 
chins resting in their palms, listened with increasing emotion 
until he came to the impressive lines, 

O mort! tu peux attendre; eloigne, eloigne- toi! 

and had gone on to the end of the poem; and it was only 
after he had put the book back in the case that the pupils 
took a deep breath and returned to their schoolday tasks 
from this glimpse of the tremendously dramatic life of their 
great-grandfathers. Such reading, I soon discovered, was 
not a rare kind of exception, nor was it the work of any 
special teacher of expression, but only a regular part of the 
duties of all grade teachers. 1 

If lessons in reading are well directed, they are, I believe, 
likely to be more important than most formal lessons in oral 
composition. The pupil has practice in pronunciation, he 

1 The normal schools have special teachers of reading. 



READING AND LITERATURE 123 

is obliged to fix new words in mind, and he is led to exercise 
his sense of relation. But these are only the most common- 
place benefits. Above these stands one that we seem too 
frequently to forget; namely, that the entire process of 
reading aloud deepens the feeling of the one who reads — 
that is, when he reads well — and completes the meaning 
of the author in a way that is impossible if one peruses 
silently. The reader's life is quickened by his own activity, 
and while he is in this impressionable state, he is brought 
into close contact with vigorous thought and a variety of 
emotions recorded in language good enough to remember. 
Reading that is in any such manner lifted above the conven- 
tional and the perfunctory must inevitably influence a 
pupil's entire mental experience. 

B. In the Upper Grades: Explication of Texts 
1. The Method of Explication 

As we advance in the grades toward the time when the 
boy is fourteen or fifteen years of age, the emphasis in read- 
ing lessons is gradually shifted. Oral reading becomes less 
and less the center of study and becomes more and more a 
subordinate part of an exercise that the French call explica- 
tion des textes. This method of studying literature seems 
to have had its origin in the explication of Latin and Greek 
texts. When, however, it came to be applied generally to 
the mother tongue, it underwent so many changes in meeting 
the demands of a living language, that it is now quite differ- 
ent from the method employed in the study of the Classics. 
It is, in truth, when one considers the whole procedure and 
its spirit, almost unique in character. To be sure, it must 
partake of other methods of literary study; but in its propor- 
tion, its balance, its completeness, its intent, it is distinct. 
It is not merely the annotation of texts read carefully in 



124 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

class; it is not like our so-called appreciative study in 
which the teacher endeavors to lead the pupil, without 
too minute analysis on his part, to catch the spirit of an 
author or to see the beauty of his work; it is not any species 
of meat-axe criticism in which the teacher leaves only a 
chopped-up carcass for the edification of the pupil; and it is 
not a dry study of words, or an overminute study of gram- 
mar or rhetoric. It is, rather than any of these, an exercise 
that aims to seize upon and unfold an author's purpose and 
his meaning so that the pupil will be in a condition of mind 
to react with intelligence on what the author has said. It 
includes the study of words, of grammatical and rhetorical 
principles, the making of close analysis, and the exercise of 
judgment; but these are all subordinate to the one purpose 
of catching the full force of the author's meaning. It is not 
exclusively historical, biographical, or critical; it combines 
the best parts of all three. It is an attempt to get rid of all 
the mental friction possible, so that what a writer has said 
will find its way into the pupil's deepest consciousness. 

It would be impossible to detail step by step the proced- 
ure followed in a great number of different instances; and 
it would be quite as impossible to show all that the exercise 
is in spirit. I shall, however, point out some of the funda- 
mentals of the method as I saw it in practice, try to suggest 
some of its spirit, and give at least one typical example. 

The first requisite in the explication of a text is thorough 
word-by-word knowledge. This part of the study is based 
upon the simple theory — sometimes hopelessly forgotten 
by teachers of literature — that appreciation must come, 
first of all, from knowing what an author has said. De- 
spite all that has been written about the French people's 
worship of form, they are chiefly interested in substance. In 
every schoolroom exercise based on a French classic, the 



READING AND LITERATURE 125 

greater part of the teacher's energy is devoted to helping 
the pupil to answer the question, " What does it mean ? " 
In fact, in most instances it is only as the form emerges 
significantly from the meaning, that it is considered at all. 
Thus it comes about that this first part of the explication is 
very important. There must be no wrongly or imperfectly 
understood words or idioms to prevent the pupil from com- 
prehending. Then, when these purely verbal difficulties 
have been cleared away, the teacher calls upon some of the 
pupils to read or, perhaps, to summarize the lesson in a few 
words, so that he may feel justified in passing on from this 
part of the exercise. 

Usually the next step is to observe the organization of the 
ideas. Guided by the teacher, the pupils endeavor to find, 
at the outset the author's chief idea, his general theme. 
If the passage studied is not a complete poem or story or 
essay, but a fragment of a longer work, the teacher first of 
all relates it to the general theme of the large unit from 
which it has been taken, so that the pupils will not fix it in 
mind as something isolated. When this is once done, and 
the central idea has been firmly grasped, the teacher directs 
attention to the subordinate ideas and, logically, to the 
divisions of the text that mark the limits of these ideas. 
Then the next smaller divisions are taken up, and so on 
down to the smallest idea that is really of consequence. 
The pupil's notion of the text is, then, unified and balanced. 
He does not see it as so many words whose individual mean- 
ings he has learned, or as so many large divisions that lack 
clearness of detail, but as a well-conceived purpose that the 
author has carried out more or less perfectly from the 
largest divisions to the smallest. Structure is emphasized, 
because structure helps to reveal the author's meaning; yet 
words and idioms also must be considered, for in a master- 



126 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

piece every word and every idiom has significance. The 
pupil must gather a meaning that is accurate and com- 
plete, and he must experience in some degree the author's 
original emotion. 

The comment made in the course of the explication is, 
quite naturally, more inclusive than that in the earlier 
reading classes. Nothing that might help to render the 
passage lucid and luminous seems to be omitted. Both the 
subject-matter and the expression are regarded from a dozen 
different approaches. The pupil is required to compare 
and, especially, to contrast the ideas with others that are 
already familiar to him; he is asked to compare the images 
with others that he can recall from his reading or experience ; 
he is put to the intellectual trouble of distinguishing between 
matter-of-fact and poetic conceptions; he is led to see that 
literary art is neither technical perfection nor absolute 
abandon, that structure must not project through, yet must 
not be hidden. Furthermore, the moral and social life of the 
time in question is made to stand out distinctly. Teachers 
do not offer long discussions of the matter, and they do 
not ask pupils to read what somebody has said second- 
hand, but they habitually assign letters and memoirs that 
have at the same time both literary value and power of 
illumination. The life that is reflected in complementary 
reading of this kind always interests students, it gives them 
something solid to stand upon, and it stimulates imagination 
and reflection. For boys of fifteen, sixteen, or seventeen, it 
is held to be infinitely better than overnice critical discus- 
sions of literary refinements which only a mature man or 
woman can see, and which, perchance, the writer himself 
never intended. 

It is true that explication of texts might easily become 
mechanical or unwieldy in the hands of an unskillful teacher. 



READING AND LITERATURE 127 

The danger is generally obviated through the pedagogical 
training of the teacher — if it is not obviated by his native 
ability — and by the insistence of the Minister and in- 
spectors that teachers master the art of selection. Such a 
teacher as one is most likely to meet in the classroom seems 
to have learned what pieces of literature are easily adapted 
to pupils of a given age. In other words, he has learned 
what to assign. Moreover, he seems to have profited in his 
teaching experience by discovering what kinds of language 
difficulties are usually most troublesome, so that he can deal 
with these without discussing other problems that the pupils 
have solved themselves, or that do not require solution at 
the time. The lesson does not, then, degenerate into an 
incoherent study of language. Again, the typical teacher 
reveals much skill in making the biographical comment. If 
the fife of an author has a special bearing on the piece 
assigned, he offers due explanation, just as he comments on 
historical or aesthetic or philosophical questions that arise; 
but he does not make the work of the class into a course in 
literary history. The chief purpose is to learn literature, 
not facts about literature. 1 If the life of the times dealt 
with is significant, the pupil learns of it through the reading 
of other assignments in literature — letters, very fre- 
quently — that deal with the period. The manual of liter- 
ary history, if used at all below the university, is used 
sparingly, and almost solely for the purpose of enabling a 
pupil to orient himself when he begins to study the writing 
of a given author. 

The pupil, too is expected to contribute toward a stimu- 
lating, profitable hour. He is constantly reminded by the 

1 " Tell me," said a French lady who had been a teacher, " something 
about the life of Longfellow. You Americans always know everything about 
the money an author made from his first poem, about his sisters-in-law, his 
wife's stepfather, his niece's fiancfi, and the color of his favorite uncle's eyes." 



128 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

attitude of the teacher that lessons are for the benefit of the 
pupil. He must be alert, he must reveal some intelligence, 
and he must exercise his mental powers without reserve. He 
learns early in his school career that perfunctory answers 
are only a waste of time. " It is admirable," said a boy of 
thirteen in response to the opening question about a short 
poem. " Of course it is admirable," exclaimed the teacher 
with some wrath. " If it were not admirable, we should not 
be studying it." Then he turned to another boy and asked 
him to say something that was not taken for granted by 
everybody. The attitude of which this instance is typical 
is maintained, too, toward answers that the pupils have read 
from an editor's commentary. " Perhaps that is true," I 
heard many a teacher say, " but that is not your answer; 
you read that in a footnote. Now tell us what you think 
about the matter yourself." He is not required to classify 
all his reading according to " schools " or literary theories; 
but he is asked to engage in the process of reflection. The 
reading is expected to produce a reaction definite enough to 
be expressed clearly in acceptable French. 

The final step in the explication is, ordinarily, the reading 
of the entire assignment aloud. The reading at the begin- 
ning of a lesson is only preliminary; it is meant to contribute 
to the explanation. But this reading at the end is supposed 
to embody all the knowledge that has resulted from the 
explication. The author's thought, his feeling, and his 
imagery must now be clearly reflected. Almost invari- 
ably, too, the teachers insist upon reading that is good 
technically, just as in the lower grades. The boy who 
stumbles over the words, or reads monotonously as if he did 
not feel the author's full meaning, or gets an unpleasant sing- 
song into the reading of verse, is sure to feel the wrath of his 
teacher and not infrequently the disdain of his classmates. 



READING AND LITERATURE 129 

It seems not to be thought unworthy of a young gentleman 
— who is probably growing a downy moustache — to read 
pathos, simple narrative, humor, tragedy, or exalted poetry, 
as if he felt what he read. 

2. An Example of Explication 

Let us consider an example of explication. Many diffi- 
culties, I am aware, must attend any attempt to reduce 
classroom discussion to the printed page. To begin with, 
not all aspects of a given method will reveal themselves in 
one recitation. 1 There is the danger, too, of an impression 
of false proportion: something may be omitted or passed 
over hastily that some reader feels is very important; or 
perhaps even if it is not important, some reader wishes for 
personal reasons to have it discussed fully. Furthermore, 
it is extremely difficult to put much of the spirit of a recita- 
tion into print. The teacher's outline and the full notes I 
secured will enable me, however, to indicate the facts of the 
lesson, and the exercise thus reconstructed may suggest a 
little of the spirit in which teacher and pupil carry on the 
work. This recitation was in Lycee Hoche, Versailles, and 
it was conducted by Monsieur J. Bezard, who is recognized 
as a skillful teacher. Most of the boys in the class were 
sixteen years of age. 

The text for study was Lamar tine's short poem, I'lsole- 
ment. It had been assigned some days in advance, so that 
the pupils might have ample time to read and reread it and 
to reflect upon it. The very definite purpose of the recita- 
tion, which covered two full hours (with a short intermis- 
sion in the middle of the session), was to discover in the 
poem the essential characteristics of the romantic state of 

1 The following lesson is, for example, chiefly an explication of literary 
history. If the same teacher had been treating Corneille or La Bruyere, he 
would have given larger place to grammar and the history of words. 



130 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

mind. In keeping with the accepted practice in France, 
the teacher had cleared the way for a good recitation by 
making definite suggestions to the pupils and by preparing 
himself with extreme thoroughness. Throughout the two 
periods the pupils wrote down from time to time such notes 
as seemed important. This practice, the teacher pointed 
out, was valuable not only in the individual recitation, but 
in summarizing the year's work. At the end of the year, 
the pupil possesses an extremely serviceable commentary 
on all the reading he has done. Monsieur Bezard has, too, 
a very stimulating way of writing with the pupils. He does 
not write, nor do the pupils, in the midst of the discussion 
of a given question, but as soon as a matter is threshed out, 
as soon as a conclusion is reached, teacher and pupil write 
together; but each, of course, in his own way. After they 
have written, the next question is taken up. As to the 
spirit of this recitation, it may be said, I believe, that the 
teacher's chief concern was threefold: (i) to set the pupils 
to thinking and talking; (2) to have them express them- 
selves with absolute sincerity and without reserve; and (3) 
to keep them in a pleasant state of mind. 

/. THE SUBJECT-MATTER 

In the recitation itself, the teacher begins by speaking 
briefly about the Meditations, the volume in which Vlsole- 
ment was originally published. He explains that perhaps 
the Cid in 1636 and Andromaque in 1667 were the only other 
writings in French that had been received with such favor 
as had the Meditations. Lamartine, he points out, was 
unknown in 1819, yet celebrated in all Europe in 1820. It 
seemed that the Meditations, like other books that meet the 
need of a certain time, had been waited for by the people. 
It met an immediate response. Vlsolement, the first poem 



READING AND LITERATURE 131 

in the volume, is itself sufficient to define the public taste of 
that date; it represents the romantic state of mind. 

A. Analysis 

The teacher then asks a few clear-cut questions about the 
preparation that the pupils have made, remarks that he 
hopes every boy has studied the poem with great care and 
has made a written plan of it, and then calls upon a boy to 
read. The boy begins to read, but the teacher interrupts 
him. " Don't miss anything. Read all. You have for- 
gotten the title." Then the boy reads: 

L'lSOLEMENT l 

(1) 
Souvent sur la montagne, a l'ombre du vieux chene 
Au coucher du soleil, tristement je m'assieds; 
Je promene au hasard mes regards sur la plaine, 
Dont le tableau changeant se deroule a mes pieds. 

(2) 
Ici gronde le fleuve aux vagues ecumantes; 
II serpente, et s'enfonce en un lointain obscur; 
La. le lac immobile etend ses eaux dormantes 
Ou l'etoile du soir se leve dans l'azur. 

1 This illustrative lesson requires the use of the original language of the 
poem. For the convenience of readers who do not know French, I append a 
translation, made by Professor Francis Daniels, of Wabash College. 

ISOLATION 

(1) 
Oft on the mountain, in the old oak's shade, 

Sadly at close of day I take my seat; 
Upon the plain my random look is laid, 

Where spreads a changing picture at my feet. 

(2) 
Here bickers with its foaming waves the stream; 

It winds, and in dim haze is lost afar; 
Yonder the drowsy lake lies all adream, 

Where rises in the blue the evening star. 



132 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

(3) 

Au sommet de ces monts couronnes de bois sombres, 
Le crepuscule encor jette un dernier rayon; 
Et le char vaporeux de la reine des ombres 
Monte, et blanchit deja. les bords de l'horizon. 

(4) 

Cependant, s'elancant de la fleche gothique, 

Un son religieux se repand dans les airs: 

Le voyageur s'arrete, et la cloche rustique 

Aux derniers bruits du jour mele de saints concerts. 

When he finishes the fourth stanza he says, " There is the 
first part of the poem. The poet has described the country 
at twilight." 

" Yes, in a way," replies the teacher; " but you have for- 
gotten the important part. You say these stanzas are a 
description of the country at twilight. What are the char- 
acteristics of this period of the day ? " 

One pupil: " Obscurity." 

Another: " Mystery." 

The pupil who has read: " Tranquillity." 

" That is it," rephes the teacher. " At twilight when 
everything sinks into half obscurity, one gains the impres- 
sion of great repose, great calm in nature. Let us write 
then for the first part ..." 



(3) 

The gathering dusk still casts a farewell light 

On these dark mountain summits, forest-crowned; 

The vaporous chariot of the queen of night 
Rises, and whitens the horizon's bound. 

(4) 
Now meanwhile, pealing from the Gothic spire, 

A holy sound upon the air outfloats; 
The traveller stops; as day's last hums expire 

Pealeth the rustic bell its hallowed notes. 



READING AND LITERATURE 133 

The teacher and pupils write together as the teacher 
dictates: 

General Theme 
1 . There is a singular charm in a quiet landscape. 

" Now will you continue the reading ? " 
The pupil reads on : 

(5) 
Mais a, ces doux tableaux mon ame indifferente 
N'eprouve devant eux ni charme ni transports; 
Je contemple la terre ainsi qu'une ombre errante: 
Le soleil des vivants n'echauffe plus les morts. 

(6) 
De colline en colline en vain portant ma vue, 
Du sud a, l'aquilon, de l'aurore au couchant, 
Je parcours tous les points de l'immense etendue, 
Et je dis: " Nulle part le bonheur ne m'attend." 

(7) 
Que me font ces vallons, ces palais, ces chaumieres, 
Vains objets dont pour moi le charme est envo!6 ? 
Fleuves, rochers, forets, solitudes si cheres, 
Un seul etre vous manque, et tout est depeuple! 



(5) 

But by these pictures sweet my soul unswayed 
Feels neither charm nor rapture on it shed; 

The earth I gaze on like a wandering shade: 

The sun of those who live warms not the dead. 

(6) 
From hill to hill in vain I turn my face, 

From south to north, from east unto the west, 
I traverse all the points of boundless space: 

Nowhere for me, O Joy, thou tarriest! 

(7) 
These vales, these palaces, these huts appear 

Vain objects all, whose charm for me has fled! 
Streams, rocks, and forests, solitudes so dear, 

Ye lack one soul, — all is untenanted! 



134 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

(8) 
Que le tour du soleil ou commence ou s'acheve, 
D'un ceil indifferent je le suis dans son cours; 
En un ciel sombre ou pur qu'il se couche ou se leve, 
Qu'importe le soleil ? je n'attends rien des jours. 

(9) 
Quand je pourrais le suivre en sa vaste carriere, 
Mes yeux verraient partout le vide et les deserts: 
Je ne desire rien de tout ce qu'il eclaire ; 
Je ne demande rien a l'immense univers. 

" This is the second part; and I should call it ' The poet's 
indifference to nature.' " 

"Oh, no, no!" exclaims the teacher. "That would 
never do." 

After a spirited discussion in which all the pupils partic- 
ipate, it is agreed that this part should be called " The 
indifference and coldness of nature as regarded by the poet 
in his grief." 

" What grief ? " asks the teacher. 

Several pupils: " The death of Elvire." 

Teacher: " Who was Elvire ? " 

A pupil: " Madame Charles, whom he had known at 
Aix-les-Bains in 1815 and who died a consumptive in 18 18." 

Teacher: 

" ' Un seul etre vous manque, et tout est depeuple.' 

(8) 
His course I follow with indifferent eyes, 

Whether the sun begin or end his way; 
Whether in fair or foul he set or rise, 

What matters it ? I hope naught from the day. 

(9) 
Though him I followed in his vast career, 

Mine eyes would see but empty wastes unfurled; 
Naught do I wish of all he lighteth here; 

Naught ask I of the illimitable world. 



READING AND LITERATURE 135 

" He is still broken-hearted in his sorrow, and searches 
nature in vain for an echo of his feeling. Such is the sec- 
ond part. 

" Let us now pass to the third. What do you call this 
last division, the remaining stanzas ? Read them. " 

The pupil reads : 

do) 

Mais peut-etre au dela des bornes de sa sphere, 
Lieux ou le vrai soleil eclaire d'autres cieux, 
Si je pouvais laisser ma depouille a la terre, 
Ce que j'ai tant reve paraitrait a mes yeux! 

(11) 
La, je m'enivrerais a la source ou j 'aspire; 
La, je retrouverais et l'espoir et ramour, 
Et ce bien ideal que toute ame desire, 
Et qui n'a pas de nom au terrestre sejour! 

(12) 
Que ne puis-je, porte sur le char de l'Aurore, 
Vague objet de mes vceux, m'elancer jusqu'a toi ! 
Sur la terre d'exil pourquoi reste-je encore ? 
II n'est rien de commun entre la terre et moi. 



do) 

Mayhap beyond the limits of his round, 

Realms where the true Sun brightens other skies, 

Were I to leave my body in the ground, 

What I have dreamed so long would greet mine eyes! 

(11) 

There I should quaff the fount, where I aspire; 

There love and hope once more would be mine own, 
And that ideal good all souls desire 

And which is nameless in this earthly wone! 

(12) 

Why can I not, borne on Aurora's car, 

Vague object of my dreams, soar up to thee ? 

Why still in exile stay I here afar ? 

No common bond unites the earth and me. 



136 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

(13) 
Quand la feuille des bois tombe dans la prairie, 
Le vent du soir s'eleve et l'arrache aux vallons; 
Et moi, je suis semblable a. la feuille fletrie: 
Emportez-moi comme elle, orageux aquilons! 

"The third part: I should call that the vision of the 
beyond; or perhaps it is happiness." 

" The vision of the beyond ? What do you mean by ' the 
beyond ' ? " inquires the teacher. 

" By that I mean that the poet believes there is a place 
where happiness, absolute good fortune, smiles upon men." 

" Very well," answers the teacher. "Let us write. " 

The teacher dictates and all write (See top of page 133) : 
2. Nevertheless this quiet country is not sufficient for the heart of an 
afflicted man. 

(a) Nature seems indifferent and cold. 

(b) It is somewhere in the future that the poet hopes to find reality 

(real happiness). 

B. The General Character or The Poem 

After this analysis, which is carried on rapidly, consuming 
not more than ten or fifteen minutes, the class takes up the 
study of the subject-matter in a more exhaustive fashion. 
The pupils discuss suitable subjects for lyrics, such as love 
and death; they observe how Lamar tine disregarded the 
older standards and the older ideals, how he pushed aside 
the conventions of classic art and its hatred for the expres- 
sion of personality, for the ego, and through his attitude 
gave his poetry a spirit of freshness and novelty. 

" What," asks the teacher, " is the saying which sums 
up, on this point, the classical attitude ? " 

(13) 

When on the plain the forest leaf doth fall, 

The wind of even wafts it to the vales. 
Like to a withered leaf am I withal; 

Sweep me along like it, ye stormy gales! 



READING AND LITERATURE 137 

Many pupils: "The saying of Pascal, — 'The I is 
odious! ' " 1 

" And what is the other symbolic saying, the first roman- 
tic utterance . . . ? " 

The same pupils: " The words of Rousseau 2 at the be- 
ginning of his Confessions : ' I wish to reveal to my fellow 
beings a man in all the truth of nature, and this man, it will 
be myself! . . . Myself alone! ' " 

The teacher: " Well said! There we have the doctrine 
of all the romanticists, the first which interprets for us their 
' state of mind.' Lamar tine revealed to the reader that 
which would have seemed odious, or at least negligible, a 
hundred years earlier, — his emotions, his personal feelings. 
1 Je w'assieds . . ., je promene . . ., mon ame . . ., ma 
vue . . ., je n'attends . . ., je ne desire . . ., mes yeux,' 
— always the expression of self ! As to his sentiments, it 
seems at first sight that they are nothing new. To speak 
the truth, they seem to be commonplace." 

At this word " commonplace " a few pupils give signs of 
surprise. 

" You see," remarks Monsieur Bezard, turning to me, 
" they have their own opinions of the poetry they read; and 
the art of discussing it is not wholly unknown to them. — 
But why do you protest, M ? " 

The pupil: " The word is very severe for such a poet as 
Lamartine." 

The teacher: " Possibly it seems so because you do not 
understand the word in the sense in which I have used it. 3 I 
understand here by the word a sentiment all of us meet with 

1 " Le moi est haissable." 

2 The class had studied Rousseau only a short time before. 

3 The French word was the noun banalite, which might be taken in a 
more unfavorable sense. 



138 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

often. Haven't you ever experienced the tranquillity of 
the evening ? " 

" Yes, yes! " 

" And haven't you found nature quite indifferent to your 
grief ? " 

" Yes, yes; that is true." 

" And haven't you, whatever your religious faith, shared 
the hope of the poet ? " 

Two or three pupils: " Yes, yes." 

Another: " But we could not say it in verse." 

Teacher: " That is just what I was about to remark. 
The subject of a lyric poem is always an idea that is common 
to the world. ..." 

A pupil: " Love." 

Another: "Death." 

A third: " Nature." 

Teacher: " ... apropos of which the poet opens to us 
his own heart, reveals what he calls the ' sighing of his 
soul ' ; what Victor Hugo would call his own Chants du 
crepuscule or his Contemplations; what the ..." 

Many pupils: " An elegy." 

Teacher: " Just the word Lamartine himself used in the 
commentary that follows each of his Meditations ! . . . 
It becomes quite clear, then, that that which interests us is 
not the subject-matter itself, but the sighing, the quality of 
the sighing! I doubt, for example, whether the sighings of 

D or of N [two sturdy boys in the class] would be 

capable of interesting the public, whereas those of Lamar- 
tine! . . ." 

(Laughter by the entire class, including D and 

N .) 

The teacher continues: " The question, then, really is to 
see how the sighings of the great poet render interesting his 



READING AND LITERATURE 139 

state of mind, his ' romantic state of mind ', that which he 
puts into them of himself, ' of the man himself ', as Buff on 
says." 

A pupil: " The style." 

Another: " The expression." 

Teacher: "Yes, all the qualities that make a poem of 

Lamartine differ from the reflections of D or N , or 

even from some insignificant and cold poem belonging to 
some mediocre poet of the eighteenth century, a J.-B. Rous- 
seau, a Delille, a Lebrun-Pindare. 1 Let us return, then, to 
our text." 

II. LAMARTINES EXPRESSION (DICTION) 

A. How Sometimes it Falls Short or Originality 

B. The Traces of Pseudo-Classic Taste 

" We cannot say," continues the teacher, " that every- 
thing in this elegy is absolutely original and serves to reveal 
the romantic state of mind. The severer critics can find in 
it a good many imperfections. ..." 

(Further expressions of surprise.) 

Teacher: " How's this ? You do not find any worn-out 
turns of expression, any artificial images that are worthy of 
Abbe Delille, or at least of Esmenard ? Search, then." 

The pupils glance through the text and mention some 
worn metaphors such as le char vaporeux de la reine des 
ombres or le char de I'Aurore; such faults as le fleuve aux 
vagues ecumantes; such inconsistencies as saints concerts 
(the word concert applying properly to the harmonious 
sounds of several wind or string instruments, and not to the 

1 The manner in which Monsieur Bezard makes a year-course of expli- 
cation into a coherent study of the past three centuries of French literature 
may be seen advantageously in his book entitled De la methode UMraire. 
Librairie Vuibert. 



140 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

single sound of a country church-bell); some additional 
faults such as la fleche gothique. 

Here we may see how the French teacher cultivates in his 
pupils the habit of precision, and to what measure he suc- 
ceeds. Their alertness is well illustrated in the discussion 
of this last phrase, la fleche gothique. As soon as it is cited, 
one boy declares that he knows this is a fault, for he has 
been at Milly, where Lamar tine said he wrote the poem, and 
the little church in the village does not have a Gothic 
steeple but a low Roman tower. And before one of his 
classmates can finish suggesting that perhaps he did not 
observe well, he holds up a postcard which he has brought 
along to show to the teacher. " Lamartine," explains 
Monsieur Bezard, " had not in 1820 the same scruples that 
we have in 1913. At that time, the public so little distin- 
guished the various periods of the Middle Ages that nothing 
suggested to the poet that Roman might not still be Gothic." 
He adds, moreover, that we feel the influence of classic 
habits on the rhythm of the new poetry. In this respect at 
least, we do not find anything very new or very original. 
Lamartine, especially in 1818, did not feel the need of de- 
parting from classical standards. Whereas Victor Hugo 
boasted of having broken up the Alexandrine, and whereas 
he created a new verse, richer, more varied, and more sono- 
rous, Lamartine was content, at least it so appears, with the 
rhymes and divisions familiar to the disciples of Boileau. 

" But," some one interrupts, " do you think this is true ? " 

Many pupils: " No, no." 

Teacher: " It is true that the effect produced is not the 
same, in spite of the relative poorness of the rhyme, in spite 
of the conservative structural character of the lines. Let 



READING AND LITERATURE 141 

///. THE ORIGINALITY OF THE RHYTHM AND 
THE IMAGES 

A. The Rhythm 

" And nevertheless, from this classic verse, in appearance 
so little modified, he draws effects that were unknown before 
he wrote." 

/. The fullness, the amplitude of the verse 
The teacher immediately resorts to example. First he 
asks a boy to read, and then he (the teacher) takes up an 
enumeration (" De colline en colline . . . ," four lines), 
an interrogation (" Que me font ces vallons . . . ," two 
lines), another enumeration (" Fleuves, rochers . . . ," 
two lines), and another interrogation (" Que ne puis- 
je . . . ," two lines); then the entire stanza (" Mais peut- 
etre au dela . . . ")■ 

" Thus the poet carries us without effort and leads us with 
him in an uninterrupted movement : he rises like the eagle 
which seems not to move its wings, which seems to rise with- 
out effort into the sky. In that manner he makes more 
profound the impression of calm in the contemplation (the 
first part of the poem), of resignation in the melancholy 
reverie (second part), and of serenity in the expression of 
hope (third part) . This is really the most original charac- 
teristic of Lamartine's poetry. Try to reread one of these 
enumerations and one of these interrogations, even if you 
are only a novice at reading aloud, and you will see how you 
are ' sustained ' by the poet, how you find time to breathe 
leisurely, how you arrive without panting at the end of a 
long period." 
A boy reads : 

" ' Mais a, ces doux tableaux . . . 
' Que me font ces vallons . . .' " 



142 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

Teacher: " There in those two stanzas you have already 
found some of Lamartine's prodigious facility." 

2. The variety of the rhythm 

" This amplitude is altogether different from mere length. 
If these periods carry one on in this manner without appear- 
ing to be long or monotonous, it is because Lamartine, with- 
out letting it be seen, has introduced a thousand elements 
of variety. 

" First, note the pauses, which are discreetly dissimilar, 
but which the reader finds by instinct, and which are the 
first secret of poetic harmony, even in the grand poetry of 
the steadier kind of gait. It is by the distribution of the 
pauses that a verse of poetry differs from a line of prose of 
twelve syllables, such as you can find by the hundred in the 
poets of the eighteenth century! Try to find the pauses in 
each part of the poem." 

And the class discovers that in many instances after a 
series of lines which march steadily, other passages have the 
pauses multiplied, prolonged, permitting long rests, so that 
the reader is sure to prolong the thought or to foresee the 
direction that the reverie will take. 

Examples : 

Souvent ° sur le montagne ^ a l'ombre du vieux chene ° 
Monte t> et blanchit deja . . . 

Que me font ces vallons, ^ ces palais, ^ ces chaumieres ° 
Fleuves, ^ rochers, °* forets, ^ solitudes si cheres ^ 
Mais peut-etre ^ 

" Here the silence is so eloquent that if one has pro- 
nounced ' peut-etre ' in a tone of surprise and hope, he leaves 
to the hearer time to feel the transition, and pass from 
despair to consolation." 



READING AND LITERATURE 143 

Then the teacher points out other pauses : 

La <^> je m'enivrerais . . . 

Que ne puis-je, ° porte sur le char de l'Aurore. 

When he finishes, he continues his observations: " Each 
gives to the stanza it introduces the time necessary for 
the mind to take wing, to the eye the time to measure 
the distance to be covered. Thus the poet without having 
willed or searched has found by instinct the secret of the 
variety in his lines ; and by so doing he has added to strength 
an incomparable grace. 

" It is the same with the sounds, that is to say, with that 
management of the strong and mute syllables which makes 
verse good verse or, on the other hand, heavier and less 
harmonious than the poorest prose. Notice first the rhyme, 
which, without being overnice, has always the sonorousness 
that is suited to a poem written in a minor key. The effects 
are nearly always the result of feminine rhymes, those which 
prolong the sound and the thought, those which leave time 
for contemplating the landscape, for being lost in the de- 
spair, for being instructed in religious consolations. Even 
many of the masculine rhymes contribute in their turn. 
For instance, obscur and azur, airs and concerts, transports 
and morts, cours and jours, deserts and univers, amour and 
sejour, leave the lines less finished than such rhymes as 
envole and depeuple, or couchant and attend] and it is not by 
mere chance that everything in the rhymes leads us to breathe 
out the voice little by little, to trail off the sounds to an 
almost inaudible close. As to the charm that comes from 
the succession of syllables more or less accented, it arises 
quite evidently from the ease with which the liaisons or the 
mutes permit the linking of the words and the sentences 
without shock, without the least appearance of hiatus. . . . 



144 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

It is the lactea ubertas of Vergil, which no one of our poets 
save Racine calls to mind better than Lamartine. Com- 
pare his poetry with the most celebrated pieces of Victor 
Hugo or Musset; you will find more strength in the 
one,- more amiable grace in the other; but Lamartine 
is unique for the tranquil sweep of his tides of harmony; 
never has the ' plaintive elegy ' been expressed with more 
gentleness and calm nobility." 

B. The Images 

" And what, finally, is the character of the Lamartinian 
image ? Without doubt it lacks the precision, the bril- 
liancy, the grandeur that we see quite often in the other 
romanticists. It is reserved, well suited to half-tints, some- 
what like the hazy indefiniteness of twilight. But never- 
theless, it is well adapted to the elegy; it helps the poet to 
put everything in the minor key, to find the expression best 
suited to each of the parts of his threnody." 

i. The half -tints in the painting of the landscape {First part) 

" You recall that Legouve referred to certain words in a 
text as ' words of significance.' These are the ones on 
which the reader leans, the ones that maintain the tone of 
the entire passage. In the first four stanzas here, what are 
the ' words of significance ' ? Read, B ." 

The pupils note the words: Tristement, la plaine, se de- 
roule, lointain, dormantes, sombres, blanchit, religieux. 

" There are the words that stand out, the ones that could 
be recalled from a rapid reading. True, the first and last 
do not suggest images. The others give only some gray 
tints; nothing luminous; nothing gaudy. As to the more 
lively images, we have seen that they are a little out of tune, 



READING AND LITERATURE 145 

that they are not even true : the river is about thirty miles 

from Milly, and the postcard that G has brought with 

him shows that it was necessary to imagine the Gothic 
steeple. The landscapes of Lamartine are nearly always 
thus. When he has wished to portray them in an ex- 
act manner, he has not always been entirely successful 
(See Jocelyn) . It has been observed, on the contrary, that 
he excelled in the portrayal of the night; that is to say, 
landscapes where one can see few things, but where one's 
feeling enables one to divine more than one can see. Here 
we see in the exterior world just what is in harmony with 
the troubled spirit of the poet, whose gaze is always half 
introspective, and who casts on the objects of the land- 
scape a part of his own melancholy. When you compare 
Lamartine's Le Lac with the passage in J. -J. Rousseau that 
inspired it, you will see the nature of this transformation 
of a distinct landscape into a hazy sketch, that which 
permits reverie to be carried away on the wings of observa- 
tion." 

2. The half -tints in the expression of grief {Second part) 

" It is often remarked that the Greeks shrank away from 
a too realistic portrayal of physical or moral anguish. For 
instance, when the artist wished to avoid showing the face 
of Agamemnon at the death of his daughter, he represented 
the unhappy father concealing his face in his mantle. La- 
martine has something of this Hellenic reserve; he is not 
carried away in any transports of enthusiasm, and he does 
not yield himself up to any violent despair; he contem- 
plates, protests by his ' indifference ' ; he is without ambi- 
tion and without ' vows ' in the presence of the unpitying 
universe; he remains calm, if not cold. 

" It does not follow that he ceased to be a poet or to think 
in images; but the images in the second part of the poem, 



146 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

as in the first, are a little gray, voluntarily browned a trifle, 
in keeping with the tendency towards reverie. ... A 
good method of testing the poetic value of images is that 
which was employed formerly by certain teachers of the 
humanities in helping the pupils to feel the beauty of expres- 
sion in Vergil. 1 It consists of summing up the poetry in a 
brief, dry, prosaic formula, and then comparing this abstract 
idea with the picture by which the poet has interpreted it." 

The teacher then designates five pupils and asks each one 
to sum up a stanza of the second part of the poem. They 
sum them up as follows : 

First stanza: I am indifferent. 

Second stanza: I do not find happiness anywhere. 

Third stanza: Nothing speaks to my heart. 

Fourth stanza: I expect nothing from time . . . 

Fifth stanza: ... nor from the things about me. 
Then the teacher compares each summary with each stanza, 
from the metaphors in the first (" ombre errante " . . . " le 
soleildesvivants") and the evocation of the third (" vallons," 
etc. ..." fleuves," etc.) to the view the poet takes of the 
great universe in the fifth. " Yes, truly," he concludes, 
" this poet is pretty nearly always one who thinks only in 
images; but the images are bathed in a light haze; they 
correspond to his melancholy." 

3. The half -tints in the expression of hope (Third part) 

" In his expression of religious sentiment, Lamartine has 
been much reproached by the orthodox because, they say, 
he lacks sufficient precision." 

A pupil: " They speak about religiosity rather than real 
religious feeling." 

1 This practice is referred to in a book on the teaching of Latin that 
Monsieur Bezard has since published. See J. Bezard, Comment apprendre 
le latin a nosfils, p. 303. 



READING AND LITERATURE 147 

Another: " Lamartine's mother one time wrote: 'My 
son stands in real need of positive faith.' " 

" But that which certain believers consider as a cause of 
religious deficiency becomes a literary beauty; by hopes a 
trifle vague he brings to an admirable close this elegy in 
half-tint. These last stanzas, far from being a bright light, 
are a series of reflections; and they harmonize well with the 
reflections of twilight! They are a reflection of Plato, first, 
with the " limits of the sphere " that man can not overleap, 
with the true sun brightening other heavens, which we may 
see only as shadows in a great cavern! Then they are a 
reflection of intoxicating Christian mysticism, in which 
Lamartine found, with Petrarch, the joys of ideal love." 

A pupil: " Lamartine says in his commentary that he 
had taken a volume of Petrarch with him to the mountain 
the day he wrote the poem." 

The teacher, continuing: — "A reflection of Petrarch, 
his master, after whom he idealized love and confused it 
with prayer. They are a reflection of nature herself in the 
season when she languishes before the approach of winter 
and with which we have a comparison in the last stanza. 
And after we have read once again this admirable compari- 
son, we shall have a more definite idea of the simplicity of 
Lamartine's themes, the harmony of his language and the 
color of his style, the depth and nobility of his feeling. It 
is justly called the first of modern elegiacs; of it one may 
say, so much does it lift one toward the mountain tops, 
' Qu'il n'est rien de commun entre la terre et lui! ' 

" Listen: 

' Quand la feuille des bois tombe dans la prairie, 
Le vent du soir s'eleve et l'arrache aux vallons; 
Et moi, je suis semblable a la feuille fletrie: 
Emportez-moi comme elle, orageux aquilons! ' " 



148 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

3. The Value of Explication 

When we add the personal presence of a good teacher to 
this thorough-going method of studying a text, we can begin 
to see why the sons of shopkeepers, physicians, military 
engineers, and artillerymen will spend two hours in the study 
of a short poem and enjoy every minute of the time. We 
can begin to understand, too, why French teachers every- 
where attach so much importance to explication of texts. 
It seems scarcely necessary to enumerate the ways in which 
such study is valuable. There can be no doubt that it 
trains the mind in logical thinking, since first of. all the pupil 
must search out the consecutive order of the ideas. Then 
it sharpens the feeling for structure and for the effective use 
of individual words. Again, the deliberation with which 
the pupil passes over the lesson fixes his attention closely on 
the subject-matter. Then, too, it gives him such a clear 
insight into a number of pieces of literature that he is much 
less likely to be content with superficial knowledge in his 
outside reading. Still again, it develops intelligent self- 
reliance. When a pupil has devoted several years to study 
of this kind, he is almost certain to form habits of doing 
work so thoroughly that he will not be perpetually trying 
merely to meet " minimum requirements " and assign- 
ments. And finally, it gives the pupil a correct notion of 
the relative importance of the general theme, the structure, 
and the language of a good piece of literature. Apprecia- 
tion, he comes to see, is neither something mechanical nor 
something vague and hopelessly elusive, but something 
toward which both knowledge and feeling contribute. 



READING AND LITERATURE 149 

III. MEMORY EXERCISES IN READING AND LITERATURE 
Not to speak in some detail about the place that memory 
exercises hold in reading lessons and in the later study of 
literature would be to distort facts. At one time, memory 
work occupied a very prominent position in the French 
school life. Teachers, however, were not always thoughtful 
in making assignments, and they forgot that memorizing 
may be worse than useless when carried on in a perfunctory 
manner. As a result, memorization lost the position it had 
formerly occupied. But educators soon began to observe 
that the adequate development of the memory was in danger 
of being neglected; so the memorization was modified and 
resumed. The practice, it may be seen by referring to the 
programmes in Chapter II, is to-day obligatory and receives 
much official encouragement. As a result, one finds the 
pupils, both large and small, carrying on the work to a 
notable degree. They learn not a few but a great many 
poems, and perhaps as many good pieces of prose. 

There is nothing unusual in the order of procedure. After 
the pupil has thoroughly mastered the general sequence of 
ideas, he learns some logical division of the selection each 
day so that by the time he has finished the reading assign- 
ment he is in possession of one or more of the best passages 
in it. Or, if he is studying a group of short poems, he has 
learned two or three of them by the time he has finished the 
study of the group. When a pupil is called upon, he is 
ordinarily required to recite the entire passage or poem, so 
that he will not have a broken, disjointed impression of the 
author's meaning. In these memory exercises we see again 
the tendency of the French to fill their recitations with 
well-directed activity. If a boy mumbles or drones — 
something, indeed, unlikely — the teacher finds a way of 
stimulating him to a more distinct manner of expression; if 



150 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

a boy fails, some of his keen-eyed, wide-awake classmates 
are always ready to take his place and try to do better. 

One finds a number of safeguards against the danger of 
mere parrot-talk. To begin with, teachers give much 
thought to selecting the memory passages. They have 
constantly before them the warning of the Minister against 
the evils of careless choosing: 

" It is impossible to exercise too great care in the selection 
of pieces to be committed to memory: for a long time they 
will be almost the only intellectual nourishment of the child. 
It can be seen, then, how important it is not to fix in his 
retentive memory anything insignificant in meaning or 
mediocre in form. Assuredly it is not easy to find pieces 
that are at the same time both simple and interesting; but 
gradually the teacher, in the course of his reading, will bring 
together a collection for his own use, although this will not 
prevent him from making thoughtful use of collections pre- 
pared by others. The essential point is that the piece 
should always be' chosen by him, and chosen because it 
meets certain needs, fulfills certain requirements, of which 
the chief one is that it should be understood and enjoyed 
by the pupils. If the piece is short, expressive, and clear, it 
will be quickly learned and easily remembered." 1 

A further safeguard is to be found in the full explanation 
that every teacher is obliged to make before he assigns a 
selection. As was pointed out in Chapter III, no teacher 
may ask a pupil to write down anything that he does not 
understand; and the prohibition holds in memorizing. 
The boy must know what he commits, so that his memory 
will retain not merely words, but ideas. Again, the exer- 
cise is kept alive and made rational by the numerous ques- 
tions that the teacher asks concerning substance or form. 

1 Instructions, p. 66. 



READING AND LITERATURE 151 

Sometimes he stops a pupil and asks him to explain a word 
that he has just uttered ; or if he suspects that the pupil is 
not visualizing clearly, he plies him with questions about 
what he sees in certain passages. In all these ways, as well 
as in many others, the pupil is kept from mere pronouncing, 
and is made to feel that reciting from memory is, in truth, 
knowing and expressing an author's meaning. 

It is remarkable how easily the French boy of ten or 
twelve commits to memory ; and it is even more remarkable 
how well he retains what he commits. The permanence of 
the pupil's acquisitions was revealed in a number of tests 
that I made. For instance, when I went to a lycee one 
morning to visit classes, I asked a teacher if he would give 
me the privilege of hearing memory passages for a time. 
He very generously offered me the entire period. Different 
members of the class were called upon to recite anything 
they had learned that year or in preceding years. No pupil 
recited anything that a classmate had already given, and 
yet at the end of the hour a great many were anxiously 
waiting with poems, parts of orations, and passages from 
prose narrative or from plays that they were ready to recite. 
Occasionally a boy remembered imperfectly, but some one 
was always ready to step into his place and continue the 
recitation without faltering. 

It requires very little reflection or imagination to see how 
boys and girls profit permanently by memory exercises of 
this kind. They catch some of the vision of great minds; 
they develop a just sense of organization and form; and 
they acquire a feeling for the use of individual words. They 
are, then, supplied with a stock of ideas, and their minds 
are filled with the echoes of language in which ideas may be 
expressed felicitously. The result may not be immediate, 
and it certainly does not come with any machinelike 



152 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

regularity or precision; but it is sure to be evident sooner 
or later. 

IV. THE RELATION OF LITERATURE TO THEME-WRITING 

In our own country, the problem of establishing a satis- 
factory relation between reading and writing seems tobe 
perennial. We never cease asking, " How is reading to be 
utilized in theme assignments ? " and " What should be the 
relation between reading and the pupil's own style ? " If, 
now, we but reflect for a moment on the character of the 
material the French boy reads and the manner in which he 
does his reading, and then recall the kind of compositions 
which the older French boys are obliged to write, we ought 
to gain some light on our own case. 

Let us consider the first question: How is reading to be 
utilized in theme assignments ? In so far as the French 
teacher has answered the question for himself, he believes 
that the reading should be the starting-point for thinking 
— the pupil's own thinking, in which he can employ the 
observations and facts of his own life — and not the basis 
of conventional literary criticisms in which the pupil is 
forced by his immaturity to write in the threadbare plati- 
tudes of the hour. Turn back to Chapter III and run 
through the theme subjects drawn from literature. Or 
glance over the list of subjects set for the baccalaureate 
examination. How are these subjects phrased ? In what 
direction do they send the pupil as soon as he fixes attention 
upon them ? Observe how they begin : " Reflect upon this 
thought expressed by a contemporary author, making use 
of your observation and experience." " Jean- Jacques 
Rousseau declared that books were the instruments of 
childhood's greatest misery. ... In a letter to some 
friend, say what you think of this opinion," etc. " Victor 



READING AND LITERATURE 153 

Hugo said ... In the poems that you have read, recall 
the influences of this love for home life." " Analyze this 
extract [from Montaigne] and set forth (1) Montaigne's 
theories of education; (2) the characteristics of his style; 
(3) some general characteristics of the Renaissance." 
Thus the assignments run. They do not call for critical 
generalizations which it is impossible for any boy of sixteen 
or seventeen to make; they call for thinking, for concen- 
tration, and for the marshaling of all the pupil's experience. 
Now, pupils cannot employ material in this manner 
unless they have read with great thoroughness. If they 
have read without forming the habit of looking on all sides 
of what the author says, they will find it next to impossible 
to write upon a given assignment that calls for thinking. 
If a pupil falters, mispronounces, reads words that are not 
on the page, leaves out many that are essential to the mean- 
ing, and expresses himself vaguely when he is asked to give 
the content of a text, he will, to be sure, find it easier to fill 
a few pages with second-hand criticism than to reflect upon 
a specific thought or a group of thoughts. But he will do 
nothing more. A boy's true critical powers develop slowly 
even under the most encouraging conditions. It is only the 
occasional pupil that normally possesses much ability of this 
kind before he is old enough to leave the high school, or, in 
France, even the lycee. His life is made up of snap-shot 
observations and impressions, and if he is hurried too much 
in trying to organize these, he will write only studiously 
conceived nothings. On the other hand, when he really 
knows what an author means in a given instance, when he 
sees well enough and understands well enough to know what 
is there, he is likely to derive genuine pleasure from discuss- 
ing the author's opinions or from finding examples of similar 
opinions, or principles, in the world about him. He sees 



154 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

how an author looked out upon life, and he will some time 
come to understand why the author's observations and 
reflections have been so universally accepted by mankind. 
If in some such manner he does not develop the power of 
grasping an author's meaning and catching the flavor of an 
author's style, he will never be prepared to say anything 
that anybody would care to read, or that he himself would 
care to write. Recognition of this fact, supported by the 
conviction that young pupils normally spend most of their 
time in seeing and not in making critical classifications, may 
be said to account chiefly for the working relation that 
French teachers have established between reading and 
writing. 

Concerning the second question, the relation of reading to 
the pupil's own style, it must be said that the best part of the 
influence of what the French boy reads comes not through 
deliberately arranged meeting-points of literature and compo- 
sition, but through the general effect of the reading upon 
the boy's life. From his earliest youth he reads something 
that is sound and clear and beautiful. Not only that, but 
in the earlier part of his school career he is carefully writing 
down in dictation exercises a great number of the best 
passages from what he reads. And to these influences, 
powerful as they are, must be added the memorization of 
much that is acceptable in substance and form. Now if we 
but bear in mind that the pupil is writing incessantly while 
he is thus engaged in assimilating a great stock of good 
literature, we can easily see how his own style must profit. 
While his mind is quickened through much writing, he 
reads, takes dictations, and commits to memory. His 
lessons in literature, therefore, become so distinctly a part 
of himself that his style, without ceasing to be his own, 
inevitably takes on some of the qualities of the literature he 
has studied. 



CHAPTER VI 

FOREIGN LANGUAGES 

Even in our utilitarian, so-called " practical " country, it is 
ordinarily taken for granted that the pupil of the mother 
tongue profits by making accurate translation of foreign 
languages. Generally, too, it is admitted that there may 
be other advantages in language study aside from this 
value of translating. These need not be dwelt upon here. 
The purpose of the chapter is to point out briefly the 
methods employed by the French in teaching Latin and the 
modern languages, and to indicate the manner in which these 
methods and the teacher's attitude toward foreign language 
study influence the pupil's own expression. 1 

I. LATIN 

In spite of all the educational changes that have taken 
place in France in recent years, Latin is holding up exceed- 
ingly well, although Greek receives little attention. After 
the greater freedom of choice that came with the adoption 
of the new programmes of study in 1902, it seemed for a 
time that Latin would be lost. The subjection in which 
teachers of the Classics had held the rest of the educational 
world was so great that when liberty came, everybody 
wanted to take full advantage of it. But as the years 

1 The history of foreign languages in France, the programmes of study, 
and classroom methods down to 1905-06 have been treated by Professor 
F. E. Farrington in his French Secondary Schools. The early relation of 
French teaching and Latin is discussed also in P. J. Hartog's The Writing of 
English. See Appendix (p. 245) . The historical view of French and foreign 
language study is interesting, but in this chapter I have preferred to adhere 
to the results of my own observation. 
155 



156 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

passed, and the many problems growing out of the new order 
of things began to solve themselves, the conviction grew that 
Latin was still important, almost essential, to a Frenchman's 
best training in the mother tongue. 1 At the present time, 
eleven years after the adoption of the new secondary pro- 
grammes, Latin is generally regarded as an extremely valu- 
able part of the upper years in the lycee, and it is believed 
that it can still be made more valuable. Even the most 
enthusiastic champions of the modern languages are quite 
firm in the conviction that Latin should not be allowed to go 
the way of Greek. This admission on their part, when we 
remember that they still hold a grievance against the Clas- 
sicists because of conditions before 1902, is a strong argu- 
ment in favor of Latin. 

A. Classroom Method 

The classroom exercises are clear-cut in character, and 
they are enough alike in different parts of the country and in 
different schools to make generalization possible. In the 
beginning classes, there is nothing especially significant to 
teachers of the mother tongue save that the pupil has the 
advantage of knowing some Latin very early in life. 2 As 
soon, however, as we pass from the elementary classes to a 
class in which a text is read, we can see that the entire 

1 In the lycees, the per cent of pupils who take Latin is steadily increasing. 
The following table, published in V Action, January 22, 1914, shows the 
increase since 1908: 

1908 53-27 per cent 

1909 t . . . 53-76 per cent 

1910 54-72 per cent 

igu 56.29 per cent 

1912 58.29 per cent 

1913 60.61 per cent 

2 The pupil begins the study of his first foreign language at the age of ten 
or eleven, or even at nine, according to the course he means to pursue and his 
progress in the first years of school. He usually begins Latin at eleven. 



FOREIGN LANGUAGES 157 

method serves immediately to give the pupil a better work- 
ing knowledge of his own language. Usually the lesson 
begins with a recitation of some memory passage that has 
been assigned a few days before. Then attention is turned 
to the reading assignment itself. First, the teacher calls 
upon some boy to read the Latin text. After he has read, 
the teacher makes such corrections as may be necessary, and 
then asks the pupil to indicate the grammatical or rather 
logical organization of each sentence. In the beginning, he 
points out the clauses: first the principal clause, and then 
the different subordinate ones. Next he indicates the exact 
function of the different clauses in the sentence; and when 
he has done this, he indicates the function of the different 
words. The purpose of this part of the recitation is to 
make the pupils understand the Latin manner of thinking. 
When the pupil who is reciting has thus indicated the rela- 
tion of the parts of the sentence, he turns to the task of giving 
his translation. This translation is not in its final form a 
literal, word-for-word equivalent, as might be inferred from 
the close analysis of the text, but a thoughtfully made, 
idiomatic French version. The French in which the trans- 
lation is phrased must be just as acceptable as the analysis 
of the Latin has been. 

The reading assignments are rather long; and in the 
recitation, the teacher usually singles out a boy and pursues 
him with demands to read, to explain, to construe, to trans- 
late, until he has satisfied himself beyond doubt that the 
boy understands the entire assignment and can turn it into 
creditable French. Then he pursues five or six others in 
similar fashion. In the meantime, the remaining members 
of the class make notes, and respond when the boy under fire 
cannot. Moreover, in some classes at least, every boy is 
required to be prepared with a written translation. Then 



158 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

as the recitation progresses, he revises this translation until 
it is faithful both to the Latin and to the French. 

As one might suppose, the work in the highest classes is 
less stereotyped. The notebook of words and syntax 
holds a smaller and smaller place, and the explication of 
texts, the making of outlines of the texts studied, and the 
discussion of supplementary matters become more and more 
prominent. But the great middle period of the course is 
a constant drill in grammar, — the grammar of the pupil's 
own language as well as of the Latin. 

I have never taught Latin, and my study of the language 
was limited to a course ordinarily covered in five or six 
years. It would be presumption, then, for me to pronounce 
judgment on French methods of teaching the subject, even 
if my observations had been more than incidental. Two or 
three questions, however, came to my mind when I saw the 
work carried on. I wondered, for instance, to what extent 
memory passages in an ancient language should be required 
of thirteen-year-old boys. The rigidity of the classroom 
exercises caused me to wonder, moreover, how far the pupils 
relied upon help from parents or older brothers in preparing 
their lessons; or how much they employed printed transla- 
tions when they made their written versions for class. I do 
not remember seeing shelves in the bookstores rilled with 
uniformly bound translations, or other " automobiles " or 
" aeroplanes " for private use; but I suppose they exist. 
This must be said, however, in favor of the French method: 
the classroom procedure is so exacting that a boy must know 
some Latin for himself, regardless of the means he may have 
employed in getting it. There is no escape from the gram- 
matical analysis, the careful making of a good French trans- 
lation, and the searching grammatical inquiry that precedes 
the work in Latin composition. 



FOREIGN LANGUAGES 159 

B. The Dominant Purpose in Teaching Latin 

One cannot long observe the French method of teaching 
Latin without seeing the dominant purpose of it all. It is 
not to develop a race of Latin specialists, although I believe 
the French rank reasonably high in Latin scholarship; and 
it is not chiefly to acquaint the pupil with Latin civilization, 
although this is regarded as more important than the nice- 
ties of scholarship. The chief purpose is to illuminate the 
study of the mother tongue. This is the one great argument 
heard on every hand in favor of Latin. Teachers some- 
times speak about the educational discipline of studying a 
dead language ; they sometimes refer to the ideals of Roman 
culture ; but they cannot speak for five minutes about Latin 
without convincing you that they believe its real value 
rests in its influence on a pupil's own speech and writing. 
" I can understand," said a teacher of Greek to me, " how 
you Americans might get along without the study of Greek, 
or perhaps even Latin; and although I love my own subject, 
I believe it would be possible for us here in France to get 
along very well without Greek, that is, the study of the 
language. But Latin, ah, it would be impossible to give it up. 
It would be giving up a part of our own tongue. You do not 
have to sacrifice so much when you put Latin aside. Your 
relation to Latin is remote. You still have the French, 
through which nearly all of your Latin has come to you. But 
if we gave up Latin, we could not look into the past at all. 
How superficial and colorless and unintelligent would our 
boy's notion of a large part of his own present-day language 
be if he had no notion of the Latin from which it is derived ! 
And his habits of thinking, too, would suffer. Our thought- 
order is largely that of the Latin; and our whole thought 
construction and our natural habits of expression are 



160 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

Classic." This is the attitude maintained to-day by many, 
perhaps most, unprejudiced Frenchmen. Latin is impor- 
tant in the study of French; therefore Latin should be kept. 

This purpose in teaching Latin goes far in justifying the 
early beginning that the boy makes. He does not begin so 
young as he did formerly, yet at the present time boys of 
eleven are studying Latin. This early beginning may have 
disadvantages; if the making of great Latin scholars is 
the end in view, it certainly must have. Yet its good in- 
fluence on the mother tongue cannot be doubted. The 
eleven-year-old child has a more active memory than the 
adolescent boy has, and as a result, he learns conjugations 
and declensions and vocabulary not only with greater ease, 
but with greater accuracy and surer permanence. He learns 
his Latin, then, early enough to make some use of it as he 
advances in his school course. There is no waiting till he is 
fifteen, sixteen, or even eighteen years old, so that the only 
influence of the study will be to disturb every language habit 
that has become fixed in his mind; he begins while his mind 
is plastic and unconsciously assimilative. 

The close relation of the study of Latin and the study of 
the mother tongue is perpetuated, too, by the fact that in the 
upper grades of the secondary school system the teacher of 
the Classics is even yet to-day the teacher of the mother 
tongue. Very recently there have been numerous pro- 
posals to have the teachers of the modern languages take 
over some of the classes in the mother tongue, but the 
prospect has threatened such serious disagreement that the 
teacher of Vergil is still the teacher of French literature and 
composition. This arrangement has sometimes proved a 
misfortune; for occasionally a teacher has been so thoroughly 
wrapped up in his Latin that his teaching of French has 
been formal and heavy, with entirely too much emphasis on 



FOREIGN LANGUAGES 161 

fixed standards, — a kind of instruction that may easily 
result from the continued study of a tongue that is dead 
and unchanging. Furthermore, one is sure to meet some 
teachers who are extremely desirous of having their pupils 
reveal their Latin erudition. Occasionally when I visited 
a class in the mother tongue and asked the teacher about 
the influence of foreign languages on a boy's speech and 
writing he would immediately spring to the defense of 
Latin and, by calling upon members of the class to give 
derivations, the history of words, and the history of 
idioms, would prove before one's very eyes that Latin was 
infinitely more important than anything else in the school 
course. But because of the increasing influence of the 
modern languages, or perhaps merely because of the general 
educational activity in France during recent years, teachers 
of this extreme type are becoming fewer and fewer, and 
those who take a tolerant, charitable view of new subjects 
and make of Latin not an end but almost solely a means, are 
becoming more and more numerous. The possibility of 
having Latin pass entirely out of the rank of important 
studies after the adoption of the. new programmes of 1902 
quickly stimulated Latin teachers to new efforts to make 
their subject really serviceable; and they seem to be 
approaching success. In any event, they have had an un- 
usual opportunity to work out the most effective methods 
of bringing Latin to bear upon the mother tongue. 

Through classroom method, then, through the conscious 
purpose of Latin teachers in teaching the subject, through 
the fact that Latin is taught early, and through the further 
fact that Latin is almost invariably taught by the teacher of 
French, the subject to-day remains a large factor in the 
pupil's development of ability to write his own language. 
Its value should not be overmagnified, nor should anyone 



1 62 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

understand that its influence is operative in the lives of the 
great body of pupils who do not take one of the Latin 
courses in the lycee, or the still greater body who do not take 
any course in any secondary school. But in the lives of 
those whose influence on the native language is likely to be 
greatest, it is and probably will continue for a long time to 
be a source of illumination and restraint. 

II. THE MODERN LANGUAGES 

When we turn from Latin to the modern languages and 
their influence on the pupil's skill in his native tongue, we 
come upon a battlefield where very recently a fierce contest 
was waged. Not yet, in fact, has all the noise of the battle 
died away. 

The record can be made very brief. Before 1902, the 
modern languages and the teachers of them were in educa- 
tional subjection. The hours for recitation were often few, 
the time allotted to pupils for preparation was decidedly 
meagre, and the teacher's general standing was below that of 
the teacher of the Classics. In the thorough investigation 
of conditions that took place in 1898 * it became evident that 
instruction in the modern languages was inadequate to meet 
the demands of the times; and when the new programmes 
of 1902 were put into effect, the teacher of these lan- 
guages came to his own. He had more pupils, he had 
more hours, his work was accepted as having greater value 
than it had formerly been supposed to possess, and, above 
all, he was provided with a method distinctly different from 
the method employed in teaching the Classics. This 
" direct method," however, is really not new; it was 

1 This investigation was authorized and directed by the national parlia- 
ment. The report of the proceedings has become a very important document 
in French educational history. See "Ribot Commission" in Appendix 
(p. 244). 



FOREIGN LANGUAGES 163 

accepted by the Minister of Public Instruction as early as 
1828 as the best method of teaching Greek. 1 But its 
popularity is recent. And since it has had a sudden rise in 
France, since its effect on the pupil's use of his mother 
tongue has been warmly debated, since it has been modified 
in some respects only within the past two or three years, and 
since there seems to be much likelihood of its being adopted 
widely in American classes, it may be well to glance at the 
method as it is seen in actual operation. Let us see, for 
example, how the French apply it to the teaching of English. 

A. The Direct Method 

The work in the beginning classes is a very active kind of 
conversation. Inasmuch as the boys who take English as 
their principal foreign language begin the study at the age of 
ten or eleven — sometimes at nine — this general activity 
is well suited to their interests. After the first few days, in 
which the time is devoted exclusively to learning the names 
of familiar things in the classroom and to mastering the pres- 
ent tense of two or three verbs, conversation is almost the 
sole means of teaching. Through it the pupils learn the 
elements of pronunciation, increase their vocabularies, and 
fix in mind the essential principles of grammar. 

" Will you come to the desk, Pierre ? " asks the teacher. 
Pierre rises, and as he goes to the desk he says, " I come to 
the desk." 

1 This fact was brought to general attention through an article by A. 
Dutertre, (pseudonym for a well-known Parisian teacher) in Les Langues 
Modernes for December, 191 1, entitled La question des melhodes en 1828. 
The Minister sought a means of reducing the time devoted to the introduc- 
tory study of Greek. Accordingly, he secured information from a great 
many teachers. Among other suggestions was one that embodied the essen- 
tials of the " direct method." To this the Minister gave his official approval; 
but before the recommendation could be carried into effect, the Revolution of 
1830 broke out, and the " direct method " seems to have been forgotten, at 
least officially, until well toward the end of the century. 



1 64 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

The teacher: " I give you this book." 

Pierre: " I take the book. Thank you." 

The teacher: " Will you please close the door ? " 

Pierre: " I close the door." 

And thus the conversation runs until all the boys in 
the class are able to talk about the familiar objects in the 
room. 

When the teacher wishes to introduce new words or to 
suggest new problems in grammar, he must make full appeal 
to his ingenuity. Perhaps I can best illustrate by taking 
some material directly from my classroom jottings. In a 
recitation which I visited early in the school year, the 
teacher wished to have the pupils understand the use of this 
and that, a and an, and before (in front of) and behind. He 
first asked a boy to go to the bookcase in the rear of the 
room. " Now," he said, " bring me that yellow book." 

The boy took the book from the shelf, and as he started 
toward the teacher he said, " I bring you that yellow book." 

" Stop ! " cried the teacher. " That will not do." Then 
he picked up a yellow book from the desk and said, tapping 
the cover of the book, " This yellow book, but (pointing to 
the book in the boy's hand) that yellow book; this book, that 
book." 

Immediately all the pupils saw the distinction and the boy 
with the book in his hand said, " I bring you this yellow 
book "; and then on his own initiative entirely, " I have 
not that book; I have this book." 

In showing them the distinction between a and an, the 
teacher called upon several boys, one at a time, to write 
some nouns on the blackboard. They wrote: 

man floor 

orange aeroplane 

boy teacher 

girl apple 



FOREIGN LANGUAGES 165 

Then the teacher asked a boy to put the article a before man 
and to supply the articles for all the other nouns. He did 
not succeed, but the next boy supplied all of them correctly. 
Then the teacher inquired, " Why did you put a before man, 
and an before orange ? " The pupil did not know; and his 
classmates could not help him. But they made a great 
number of trials and guesses; and when their interest was at 
its height, the teacher said, " In English, with few excep- 
tions, a noun that begins with a vowel takes an." And the 
boys then spent two or three minutes making tests of their 
own to see that the rule held true. 

Later in the recitation the teacher brought up the use of 
behind and before. To make the distinction clear he asked 
four boys to stand one behind the other on the floor by his 
desk. " Now," he said, " Pierre (the rear boy) is behind 
Jean." Then he asked a pupil to tell him where Jean was; 
and the boy replied immediately that Jean was behind 
Andre. And so with the next in the line. But when the 
teacher asked a pupil where the front boy was, the pupil was 
puzzled, because he saw that Ferdinand, the front boy, was 
behind no one. Then the teacher explained that Ferdinand 
was before Andre, that Andre was before Jean, and that Jean 
was before Pierre. The pupils then used the words several 
times, so that they were able to carry them away from the 
classroom with a and an, and this and that. 

As the year progresses, these exercises gradually include 
reading and writing. In the second year, the reading 
lessons and the studies in grammar occupy a still larger 
place. By the time the boys are ready to enter upon their 
third year, their conversation has begun to approach the 
natural, they can use a goodly number of words that they do 
not find in their immediate environment, they can write 
simple sentences with some ease, and they are acquainted 



1 66 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

with the fundamental principles of English grammar. They 
read many simple narratives and anecdotes in their English 
camarade; they read and commit to memory such poems as 
Longfellow's Village Blacksmith and Southey's Bishop 
Hatto; they write exercises about their reading lessons and 
pictures; and they are able to frame questions about their 
own activities and the subject-matter of their reading. 
Frequently the teacher will call a pupil to the desk and 
request him to ask his classmates questions for five minutes. 
He must exert himself to think without delay of a variety of 
matters, and his classmates are as much pressed as he, since 
they must give correct and intelligent answers at once. I 
sometimes took charge of classes, and was often amazed at 
the ability of boys of this age (eleven to thirteen) to think 
and talk in English. When I asked them questions about 
reading and grammar, they usually made extremely sensible 
replies; they could write such possessives as boys' hats, 
to-day's work, and men's coats without apparent difficulty; 
and they used the principal parts of such verbs as sit, lie, and 
go with a degree of accuracy that was astounding to one who 
devotes a part of his time each year to the reading of fresh- 
man themes. When I gave them opportunity to question 
me, their eagerness was delightful. 

" How high are the houses in New York ? " was always 
one of the first questions. Some of the others were : " What 
is the most beautiful city in America ? " " Is it as beautiful 
as Paris ? " "Do you live in New York ? " "Is Indian- 
apolis near St. Louis ? " " Is the Mississippi River larger 
than the Rhone ? " " What ship did you come over on ? " 
" Was it as large as the Titanic ? " "Do you like Long- 
fellow in America ? " (I asked the boy if he knew any of 
Longfellow's poems, and he stood up and recited The Day is 
Cold and Dark and Dreary and The Village Blacksmith.) 



FOREIGN LANGUAGES 167 

" How do you get to the top of the high buildings in New 
York ? Does it not take many minutes to go up in a lift ? " 
In answering this question I used the word skyscraper and 
asked the pupils if they knew what a skyscraper was. After 
a moment of thoughtful silence, one little fellow said, " Oh, 
it must be an aeroplane." He knew the meaning of sky and 
scrape. Immediately a timid little fellow asked, " Have you 
aeroplanes in America ? " "Of course they have," said one 
of his classmates, looking at him in utter contempt; " Wil- 
bur Wright was an American." In this manner was the 
time taken up whenever the pupils themselves had an 
opportunity to do the questioning. Their ability to ask 
questions about matters concerning which they were anxious 
to know something seems to me to be the surest proof of their 
knowledge of elementary English. 

In the third-year classes — that is, when the pupils have 
chosen English as their principal foreign language — more 
attention still is given to grammar and to the careful reading 
of texts. Just as in a lesson in the mother tongue, the 
recitation in the foreign language begins with an exercise in 
grammar, which is followed by the reading proper. The 
pupils read, and if they do not read well, they are asked to 
continue or to reread until their pronunciation approaches 
normal English and their reading really expresses the 
author's meaning. Then the text, which has been explained 
in a preliminary manner at the preceding recitation, is dis- 
cussed thoroughly. The teacher first asks different boys to 
explain in simple English the general theme expressed in 
the lesson. Then he conducts a searching inquiry to learn 
whether the boys have understood all the details. He calls 
for the meaning of individual words, for the principal parts 
of verbs, for adjectives that correspond to nouns used by the 
author, and especially for the antonyms of adjectives. The 



1 68 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

lesson is very much like a lesson in explication in the mother 
tongue, save that it is conducted in English and in a some- 
what simpler manner. And in the higher classes, let us say 
fifth-year English, the recitation really becomes a lesson in 
explication. In the study of a poem like Enoch Arden, for 
example, knowledge of the story as a whole, knowledge of all 
the individual words, the ability to grasp poetic images, and 
the power to catch the full spirit of the poem are dwelt upon 
very much as if the text were French instead of English; and 
in the study of Shakespeare very much the same method is 
followed in English as would be followed in French if the 
plays were those of Racine or Moliere. By this time the 
pupils know English well enough to talk with considerable 
freedom about brinded and branded, a newt, an adder, a 
nickname, the howlet's wing, 1 and other similar questions of 
language, to say nothing of the less easily explained subject- 
matter. 

The advanced classes are strikingly different from the 
lower ones in at least one significant respect: the lessons 
include some translation. In the lower classes, as I have 
already explained, the mother tongue is not used at all — 
unless on the part of some teachers to explain a grammatical 
distinction that cannot be made clear in any other way — 
and the original intention of the champions of the " direct 
method " appears to have been to have no translation in the 
upper classes. After the method had been in effect a few 
years, however, it seemed wise to many teachers and some 
inspectors to require enough translation to make an unmis- 
takably sure test of the pupil's comprehension of the text 
read and discussed in the foreign tongue. Thus it happens 
that in actual practice to-day the teacher of the advanced 
class frequently, if not usually, takes ten or fifteen minutes 

1 From a lesson in Macbeth, at the lycee for boys, Marseille. 



FOREIGN LANGUAGES 169 

at the end of the recitation period for the translation of the 
day's lesson. 

Everything considered, then, if a working knowledge of a 
foreign language is the end sought, the " direct method " 
must be regarded as efficacious. The pupil talks well; he 
has sufficient^ knowledge of grammar to correct his own 
speech and writing; and he reads well enough to catch the 
spirit of the literature he studies. One cannot fail to be 
impressed with the comparatively good English that boys in 
different parts of France use in conversation; and when one 
asks them where they learned the language, the reply is 
almost invariably, " In school." Many boys have, of 
course, spent a short time in England; yet when due allow- 
ance is made for these, the number who can speak English 
well is strikingly large. And many champions of Classical 
training, despite the fact that several years ago they studied 
English in the lycee, always call upon son or daughter to 
write the letters that are to be written in English, and to 
explain the difficult passages in George Eliot or Thackeray. 
Proviseurs told me, too, that whereas under the old method 
the best the boys usually did was to read some English fairly 
well and speak it not at all, they now used the language so 
well that business men sought out graduates to go to Eng- 
land on important missions, since they could not only 
understand but could be understood in English. It is true 
that I occasionally met educators, even teachers of modern 
languages, who believed that the method had so many faults 
that it was not any better than the old, or at least was in 
need of radical modification. These, however, were com- 
paratively few; and so far as I was able to observe, the only 
classes in which the method seemed to be more or less of a 
failure were the ones conducted by these teachers who were 
out of sympathy with the entire plan of instruction, and 



J 



170 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

permitted pupils to make substitutions of French whenever 
they could not easily express themselves in the foreign 
tongue. The teachers who were able and most conscien- 
tious were in favor of the method, with such modifications as 
would render it more nearly perfect; and many of them were 
firmly convinced that it must be extended to Latin if Latin 
is to be retained permanently as a vital part of French 
education. 1 

B. The Direct Method and the Mother Tongue 

But what effect has this method, however successful it 
may be in the teaching of a foreign tongue, on the pupil's 
speech and writing in his native language ? This is the 
question of moment to the American teacher of English; and 
concerning this question there is no unaniminity of opinion 
in France to-day. By some it is thought that the method 
has worked absolute harm in this respect. Their argu- 
ment is (1) that the French boy, however skillfully he may 
write to-day, does not write so well as he did formerly; and 
(2) that the falling off is to be attributed to the " direct 
method," inasmuch as it deprives the boy of most of his 
former practice of translating into his own tongue and 
obliges him for one or two hours a day to think, speak, and 
live wholly in the language of another people. 

This question was so seriously and so vigorously discussed 
by French educators, and it seemed to me to be of so much 
importance, that I took it up for study. To be sure, I did 
not expect to find any positive proof that would settle the 
matter for all time, but I hoped to gain some light. Accord- 
ingly, I visited a great many more classes in English than I 
had originally intended to visit; I conferred with many 

1 One of these teachers had taught his nine-year-old daughter to converse 
with him in Greek. 



FOREIGN LANGUAGES 171 

teachers of the mother tongue whose pupils were taking the 
modern languages; and I prepared some definite questions 
and submitted them to the teachers and school officials with 
whom I came into contact from day to day, and sent many 
copies by mail to others whom I could not see conveniently. 
I asked (1) whether the French pupil probably writes as well 
to-day as he did twenty or thirty years ago; (2) whether the 
decrease in skill, if there has been any, is to be attributed 
to one or to many causes; and (3) whether the " direct 
method " seems to have had a pronounced effect on the 
pupil's ability to use his native language. 

The answers revealed a variety of opinions. Some of the 
persons questioned thought there was, perhaps, a falling off 
in pupils' ability to write, but that the change was due to a 
general preoccupation with practical matters rather than to 
any method employed in the schools. Others said that 
there had been some change for the worse, but that the social 
conditions under the Republic were responsible, in that they 
raised the standard of the lowest only at the price of lower- 
ing the standard of the highest. Still others who believed 
there had been a deterioration thought the "direct method" 
partly responsible. They held, however, that with correc- 
tions and modifications in the method — some of which have 
already been made — the objection would be removed. 
A few thought any study of foreign language must always 
be dangerous to good style in the mother tongue; and some 
of these quoted Gladstone's supposed words, "I do not want 
to study French, for I should then have French injected 
into my English." Some teachers of English were of the 
opinion that the " direct method " has no special influence, 
either good or bad, on pupils' speech and writing; that 
perhaps the old method of translating, when well directed, 
really did help; and that if its passing has resulted in a 



172 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

loss, it is to be made up by the teacher of the mother tongue. 
" If our teachers of literature and composition have taught 
French by teaching English and German," said one teacher 
with a bit of feeling, " let them now find a way of teaching 
French by teaching French." Some teachers, some school 
officials, and some laymen believed that pupils to-day write 
less elegantly and in some ways less correctly than they did 
thirty years ago, but that they write with more vigor and 
more sincerity. These persons had no fear of the influence 
of the " practical," and felt certain that if style is changing 
unfavorably, it will correct itself in due time. One man 
believed that the " direct method " has less effect of any 
sort on the mother tongue than the old translation method 
had, since under the new method pupils are not obliged to 
inject the foreign language into their own. They think only in 
the foreign tongue while they are in the classroom, and when 
they turn their attention to subjects that call for thinking in 
the mother tongue, there is no memory of a confusing jumble 
of distorted, half -translated sentences to fill the mind. And 
not a few were of the opinion that the " direct method " has 
its dangers, but that it is so thoroughly superior as a means 
of teaching the foreign tongues that it ought not to be 
abandoned or even modified, whatever its effect may be 
on the pupil's French. These proposed as a corrective, 
if a corrective should be required, that the pupil devote 
additional hours to the study of French literature and the 
practice of composition. 

From a great variety of sources, however, came one 
opinion that outnumbered any of the others. It was that 
the decline in the French boy's ability to write is something 
apparent rather than real; that the good pupil to-day 
writes just as well as the good pupil did twenty or thirty 
years ago; but that the secondary schools, the center of the 



FOREIGN LANGUAGES 173 

discussion, have been so thoroughly popularized that instead 
of educating the chosen few, as formerly, they must now 
educate everybody. The result is, then, that the good 
pupils seem not to be so numerous as they once were. The 
men who held this opinion expressed the belief that it would 
require the microscopic eye of the most highly trained peda- 
gogical expert to discern any real injury resulting from the 
" direct method." They were firm in the conviction that 
the new method is effective in its immediate purpose, 
and many of them believed that it could readily be devel- 
oped so that it would be of supplementary value to the 
teacher of the mother tongue. 

This opinion seems to be well founded. It is, of course, 
too early to say what direction the new method will finally 
take in France, since it has been established only eleven 
years, and is still largely in the experimental stage; but to an 
unprejudiced onlooker it seems quite premature to rule it 
out of the category of good influences on the mother tongue. 
To be sure, in the lower classes no opportunity to profit by 
translating is provided; and in the upper classes written 
translations are miraculously rare, while written exercises in 
the foreign tongue are numerous. Nevertheless, the method 
has value. The pupil, forjnstance, is trained in thinking, 
and good thinking is valuable, whether it be done in French 
or Chinese. Then there is the inevitable enlarging of the 
pupil's vocabulary; and there is also the habit of seeing and 
feeling words clearly and sharply. Moreover, such mental 
activity as one finds in the foreign language classroom can- 
not fail to contribute to a literary conscience. Habits of 
carefulness in choosing words, handling sentences, and 
analyzing thought may not influence a boy's speech very 
much immediately, but if they are well established, they will 
some day have their effect. 



CHAPTER VII 

THE FRENCH BOY'S TEACHER * 

If it were not a part of human nature ever to be forgetting 
things that are taken for granted, I should not make the 
commonplace observation that the teaching of the mother 
tongue resolves itself eventually into a question of the 
teacher. It matters not how ingenious a body of educators 
may be in devising methods, the mediocre or weak teacher, 
by following them imperfectly or by following them blindly, 
is certain to remain feeble and ineffective. On the other 
hand, the capable teacher will succeed to some degree 
regardless of method; he will soon work out a method of his 
own that will serve him better than any that might be sug- 
gested by another person. Nevertheless, he, more than his 
weaker colleague, profits by having boundaries fixed, by 
having general direction suggested, by having ends pointed 
out clearly; and he, in turn, in spite of whatever marked 
characteristics he possesses, will contribute infinitely more to 
the successful application of any method than will a teacher 
who merely fits into the machine. It should be illuminat- 

1 This study was made frankly from the point of view of the teacher of 
the mother tongue. If the reader is interested in discussions more general 
in purpose and more documentary in character, he should see Special Re- 
ports on Educational Subjects, vol. 24 (See Appendix), and the two books by 
Professor Farrington also referred to in the Appendix. 

I wish to acknowledge my indebtedness to M. Lucien La vault, proviseur 
du Lycee Gassendi, Digne, for valuable suggestions about the preparation of 
teachers, the state examinations, the duties of inspectors, and the working- 
hours in the secondary schools, as well as for his careful reading of the earlier 
part of this chapter in manuscript. 



THE FRENCH BOY'S TEACHER 175 

ing, then, to see what kind of teacher presides in the French 
school: to study the preparation he makes for his profes- 
sion, to understand the conditions under which he works, to 
see the kind of man he is, and to learn something about the 
spirit that he develops in his classroom. 

I. THE PREPARATION OF THE TEACHER 

The course of purely scholastic and academic preparation 
required of teachers in France in either the primary or the 
secondary school system is likely to impress an American as 
being extremely formidable. The months and years are 
long, the study itself is exacting, and the entire course is full 
of examinations conducted by the national government. It 
is true that the great demand for teachers in the primary 
system sometimes forces school authorities to accept men 
and women who have not conformed in every respect to the 
highest requirements. In the main, however, candidates 
to-day fit themselves in the regular manner prescribed by 
the school system in which they expect to teach. For this 
reason it is possible to discuss the teacher's preparation 
with a degree of definiteness. The general purpose of his 
training and the limits toward which he pursues his study 
are, for a given kind of work, just the same in one end of 
the country as in the other, just the same in the small village 
as in the large city. 

A. Preparation in the Primary School System 

In order to be a teacher in the primary school system, the 
candidate must first complete a regular course in a lower 
and higher primary school or, much less likely, in a lycee. 1 

1 Even if he has completed a course in the lycee, he must have at least the 
brevet elementaire of the primary system. He is not entitled to teach in the 
primary system simply because he is a bachelier from a lycee. 



176 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

After he has completed this course he is ready, if he is at 
least sixteen years of age, to take his first important exami- 
nation, the passing of which entitles him to his brevet elemen- 
taire. This certificate is the essential minimum. It 
matters not what course of study a person may have pur- 
sued, if he decides to teach he is required to present this 
certificate; and if he pursues the regular course outlined for 
teachers, he must have it when he seeks admission to the 
normal school. 

When he is once in one of the four score or more primary 
normal schools maintained for men, 1 he has a three-year 
course before him. During the first and second years, his 
studies are purely academic. They include history, one 
modern language, mathematics, natural sciences, manual 
training, agriculture, and much study and practice in the 
mother tongue. 2 At the end of the second year, the student 
takes another state examination over the work, he has 
covered. If he fails, he is dropped from the school, since it 
is not thought worth while to train a teacher who is ob- 
viously deficient in scholarship. If he passes, he receives a 
certificate called the brevet superieur, which admits him to 
the third year of his course. The last year is taken up 
exclusively with professional studies and such complemen- 
tary work as may help to give the student general culture. 
The purpose of the year, according to the official pro- 
grammes, 3 is to awaken the students to a need of con- 

1 There are about as many for women. 

2 The outline of the normal-school course of study in the mother tongue is 
too long to be printed in the body of this chapter. I have, however, included 
a translation of it in the Appendix (pp. 246 ff.). The reader should note how 
the work in grammar, composition, and literature is related, he should study 
the pedagogical directions that accompany the programmes, and he should 
remember that this course is for grade teachers. 

3 See Programmes d'Enseignement des E coles normales primaires (19 12- 
13), P- 57- 



THE FRENCH BOY'S TEACHER 177 

tinuing their intellectual development after they leave the 
school. Consequently practice teaching, pedagogy, the 
elements of law and political economy, and French literature 
and history have chief place. These are supplemented by 
readings and lectures on subjects designed to extend the 
horizon of the students, so that their special knowledge 
shall not be without background. 

When the candidate has completed this last year of his 
normal-school course, 1 he receives a certificate to that effect, 
and is then ready to enter upon the two years of probation 
exacted of everyone who would be a teacher. If, however, 
HeThas done practice teaching in the normal school after he 
has passed the age of eighteen, this will count toward meet- 
ing the requirements of probation. When he has been a 
probationer, a stagiaire, for two years, he takes the examina- 
tion for his final certificate for grade teaching, called the 
certijicat d? aptitude pedagogique. 

If, however, he should desire to teach in a higher primary 
school — and this school, it will be remembered, is much like 
our best type of manual training high school — he must 
make further preparation and secure a special certificate. 
And if he wishes to become a candidate for a position in one 
of the departmental normal schools such as he has himself 
attended, he must pass a competitive examination that 
entitles him to enroll at a special normal school at Saint- 
Cloud, 2 and complete a two-year course designed to fit 
him for normal-school teaching. Then he must pass an- 

1 Formerly the brevet superieur was granted at the end of the course. 

2 The corresponding school for women is at Fontenay-aux-Roses. Singu- 
larly enough, the course in this school for women is a year longer than that in 
the school for men. «Jn Annuaire de la Jeunesse (for 1913, p. 986) it is 
explained that theoretically the course for men at Saint-Cloud is three years 
in length, but that educational needs and the exigencies of the budget have 
thus far made only two years possible. 



178 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

other competitive examination before he is entitled to a 
position. 

The prospective teacher in the primary system, then, 
passes through the lower and higher grades, the higher 
school that corresponds roughly to one type of American 
high school, he goes three years to the normal school, and 
then, perchance, he goes to the special higher primary 
normal school. When a candidate who possesses adequate 
native ability has passed through this entire process, or even 
the major part of it, there can be little doubt about his 
general fitness to practice his profession. And there can be 
no greater doubt about his special fitness to teach the mother 
tongue. He must, in the first place, pass through the period 
of dictation, word-study, grammar, theme-writing, general 
notebook writing, memorization, and explication of texts 
that we have considered in the preceding chapters; he must, 
in the higher primary school, become acquainted with at 
least one foreign language; and in the normal school he must 
take more work in his own language and literature than in 
any other subject save pedagogy. This work in the normal 
schools, moreover, is very good in quality. I visited several 
classes in the primary normal school for men at Paris, and I 
examined a number of the notebooks kept by students. The 
teaching was exceedingly well done, and the notebooks were 
models of order and neatness. These normal schools con- 
tribute much to good writing. Furthermore, in the numer- 
ous examinations that the candidate must write from time 
to time along the way, composition is regarded as extremely 
important. ' If, therefore, we believe there is virtue in the 
study and practice of the mother tongue, we must admit 
that the teacher in the French primary schools is relatively 
well prepared for his work. 



THE FRENCH BOY'S TEACHER 179 

B. Preparation in the Secondary School System 

In the secondary school system, the preparation is even 
more comprehensive. If a young man hopes to become a 
teacher — and the preparation of a young woman must be 
in its larger aspects the same — he must have as a beginning 
a bachelor's degree. In other words, he must have com- 
pleted a course in the lycee, which, we remember, carries him 
approximately as far as the end of the sophomore year in an 
American college, and he must have passed a state examina- 
tion at the end of his course. 

In meeting this requirement, he must take the regular 
preliminary work in the lower grades of the lycee, and then 
when he has completed the first cycle of his course proper, he 
must choose for the remaining years one of four groups of 
subjects: (1) Latin-Greek, (2) Latin-Modern Languages, 
(3) Latin-Science, (4) Science-Modern Languages. After he 
has completed this work up through the First Class, the 
highest regular class save one, 1 he takes the first part of his 
baccalaureate examination. If he passes, he takes as his 
last year in the lycee a special course either in mathematics 
or in philosophy; that is, he pursues one of these subjects 
as a " major." Then he presents himself for the second half 
of the examination. If he passes this successfully, he 
is entitled to the degree of bachelier. 

The examination for the baccalaureate is, so far as one can 
see, wholly free from personal influence or prejudice, and it 
is, all in all, very difficult. Except in doubtful cases, 
nothing save the student's oral and written answers to 
questions is considered; and in the doubtful cases, the can- 
didate's record in the lycee is taken into account only to 
ascertain whether there might have been any special circum- 

1 See the explanation preceding the programmes of study in Chapter II. 



180 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

stances at the time of the examination to prevent him from 
doing normal work. The applicant is examined in eight or 
nine subjects. In the first test, he has three hours to each 
subject in the written part, which regularly covers three 
subjects, and an hour for the entire oral part. If he passes, 
he takes the second test (mathematics or philosophy) a 
year later. The jury consists of four, five, or six men, part of 
them teachers in the secondary school system, and part of 
them professors in the university located where the examina- 
tion is taken. All of them, however, are strictly the repre- 
sentatives of the Minister. Perhaps it thus comes about 
that juries are so free from charges of unfairness and that 
they maintain such an uniformly high standard. In any 
event, only about fifty per cent 1 of the applicants each year 
are successful. So if a prospective teacher finds himself one 
of the fortunate half, he is justified in having no little respect 
for himself. 

Theoretically a candidate need be only a bachelor in order 
to be eligible for a subordinate position as a teacher, but in 
actual practice one is rather certain to discover that the 
holder of even the subordinate position is a man who has 
continued his study and become a master (licencie). And 
if he is ambitious to become eligible for the best positions 
and the best salaries, he must continue his study until he is 
(able to pass the examination for the agregation. This ex- 
amination is competitive, and usually requires three, four, 

1 In the October session, 191 2, the proportion of successful applicants in 
the different groups of subjects was as follows: 

Latin-Greek 45.6 per cent 

Latin-Modern Languages 45.1 per cent 

Latin-Sciences 46.4 per cent 

Science-Modern Languages 41.8 per cent 

(The second part of the examination) 

Philosophy 51.6 per cent 

Mathematics 54 per cent 



THE FRENCH BOY'S TEACHER 181 

or even five years of preparation. This preparation is made 
in the superior normal school at Paris, 1 if one is so fortunate 
as to win a scholarship there, or it may be made in the 
advanced courses of one of the universities, or by private 
initiative. In any event, the work is chiefly academic in 
character, 2 although a certain amount of practice teaching is 
required. The examination is always searching and it 
covers a wide field; so if the general average of the candi- 
dates in a given instance is high and the vacancies to be 
filled are few, even a good man runs the risk of falling short. 
Viewed in one way, the procedure seems heartless, 3 yet 
everyone must admit that it is largely responsible for the 
high standards of scholarship and general ability maintained 
among French secondary teachers. The accepted view 
among the French is that if the nation has more good candi- 
dates for secondary school positions than there are positions 
to fill, and must as a result exercise choice, the choosing 
should always be made among those at the top. 

Here in the secondary schools, as in the primary system, 
the breadth of the teacher's general training is noteworthy; 
and here, even more than in the primary system, is the train- 
ing designed to prepare one to teach the mother tongue. In 
the lycee, we have already noticed, the boy's training in his 
native language is quite thorough. It must at least give 
him enough general knowledge and skill to enable him to 
write well in his baccalaureate examination; for one require- 
ment, regardless of the course he has pursued in the lycee or 
will pursue in the university or special school, is that he 

1 Since this Ecole normale superieure became a part of the University of 
Paris in 1903, much of the purely academic work has been done in the 
regular classes at the Sorbonne. 

2 It is held by some French teachers that the examination is too exclu- 
sively academic; that experience ought to count for more than it now does. 

3 I knew one competent teacher forty years old who had failed repeatedly. 



1 82 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

prepare a good composition on one of the three subjects 
assigned. And, as was pointed out in Chapter III, this 
composition is generally regarded as one of the most difficult 
parts of the examination, if not the most difficult of all. 
The candidate must not only be able to write with correct- 
ness, but he must have a fairly wide range of knowledge, 1 he 
must be able to think, and he must know how to organize 
his knowledge and thinking quickly. In truth, the exami- 
nation is so exacting in these respects that it is in itself 
looked upon as a sufficient reason for learning to write 
effectively. From the early years of a pupil's life in the 
lycee, he is reminded by his parents, if not by his teacher, 
that every grammatical error, every misspelled word, every 
careless phrase, every feeble sentence, every heavy para- 
graph, every lapse of memory or error in judgment, will 
count against him on the day of reckoning when he seeks to 
become a bachelier. It is true that the examination may in 
this manner be overemphasized; the pupil is in danger of 
looking upon it as an end in itself. 2 Yet when one bears in 
mind the fact that good habits of speech and writing formed 
early in life are not likely to fall wholly into decay, even if 
the cause of their formation has ceased to exist, one may see 
that the long period of preparation for the baccalaureate is, 
in spite of all that may be said against it, a tremendous 
influence in favor of good writing among prospective 
teachers. 

Moreover, the candidate for the profession of teaching 
who wishes to gain admission to the Ecole normale su- 
perieure will probably profit by some very good instruction 

1 See the list of subjects in Chapter III. One teacher assured me that 
the secret of passing the examinations was to write with intelligence, whether 
or not with knowledge! 

2 I believe, however, the pupils are reminded frequently enough that they 
are preparing to live a life as well as to pass an examination. 



THE FRENCH BOY'S TEACHER 183 

that belongs neither in the regular classes of the lycee nor 
in the university, but in what is known as the rhetorique 
superieure. This is a kind of post-graduate course that has 
attached itself to a few of the lycees (for boys) at Paris and 
to the lycee at Bordeaux, at Lille, at Lyon, at Marseille, at 
Nancy, at Poitiers, at Rennes, and at Toulouse, 1 to meet a 
demand created by the rigid requirements for admission to 
the department of letters in the superior normal school. 
The history of these rhetoriques superieures is interesting, 
and one cannot fail to wonder what the systematic French 
mind will do with them eventually, since they " refuse to 
classify " in the carefully organized educational system of 
the nation. It is enough for our purpose, however, to 
know that in these courses students receive excellent train- 
ing in the mother tongue. It scarcely need be said that 
whatever writing is required is done with critical thoughtful- 
ness, for the competitive examination is always before the 
student as an incentive to his best effort. The study of 
literature is likewise more serious and more thorough than 
the work in the regular classes of the lycee, and while it really 
corresponds to first-year or second-year work in the uni- 
versity, it is free from the ultra-critical spirit that sometimes 
prevails in university classes. It is the opinion of many 
French teachers — though not all — that this instruction in 
the mother tongue is the most effective, the most perfectly 
balanced, to be found anywhere in the upper institutions of 
learning. In any case, its effect upon the secondary 
schools of the land is considerable. The courses, it is true, 
attract comparatively few students; but these are the very 
ones who through their positions as teachers will be most 
influential in shaping habits of speech and writing. 

1 Based on tables published in 1913. 



1 84 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

The later training in the superior normal school or uni- 
versity is. likewise well suited to a teacher's needs. If he 
wishes to become an agrege in letters, his three, four, or 
more years are sure to be devoted in large part to courses in 
his native language and literature. Furthermore, he spends 
many fruitful years in the study of foreign languages, so 
that he has a wide language field in which he is at home and 
at ease. After such training, he is not in very serious 
danger of being embarrassed in his own classroom by feeling 
that his pupils are about to force him to the limits of his 
knowledge. 

Just how extensive the teacher's training actually is may 
be seen in some statistics that I brought together. It 
seemed to me as I observed the usual method of preparing 
teachers, that it would be illuminating to observe how per- 
fectly the procedure was carried out in specific instances and 
compare the resulting preparation with that of American 
teachers of the same rank. I began by securing information 
about sixth, seventh, and eighth grade teachers in cities and 
towns ranging from New York down to the rural county- 
seat of three or four thousand inhabitants. This informa- 
tion I secured from the superintendents, who were asked to 
select teachers that were really representative of their cities. 
Then I secured similar information from French cities and 
towns of corresponding size, that is, from Paris down to the 
smallest town that supports a lycee. 1 Of the total number 
of American teachers reported, forty-four per cent had 
graduated from high school or some private school of equal 
rank and had spent at least two years in a college or normal 

1 Proviseurs are not permitted to give out personal information about 
their teachers unless they are authorized by the Minister to do so. I found 
it necessary, therefore, either to ask each proviseur to secure the needed 
authorization, or to have the individual teachers approve in writing the 
information which the proviseur desired to give me. 



THE FRENCH BOY'S TEACHER 185 

school, so that they might safely be regarded as having the 
equivalent of a lycee education. The other fifty-six per 
cent had either attended a college or normal school only one 
year, or had merely graduated from a high school, or had not 
finished the high-school course. As to university training, 
a few had gone to some university long enough to make an 
average of seven days for each teacher reported. In con- 
trast with this, all the French teachers had graduated from a 
lycee or other institution of similar rank, and their ad- 
vanced work in university courses averaged three and three- 
tenths years * for each teacher. It is useless to deny that 
this great difference must reveal itself in the teacher's grasp 
of his native tongue. And the difference is not only in his 
direct knowledge of his own language and literature, but in 
his background of knowledge. For instance, these Ameri- 
can teachers had taken in high school, college, and univer- 
sity, an average of four years 2 of foreign languages; the 
French teachers, an average of seventeen and five-tenths 
years. Now I am well aware that purely academic training 
does not in itself make a teacher, but if other things are equal 
— and we shall see later in the chapter that the French 
teacher is not deficient in good personal qualities — sound 
training must give its possessor a tremendous advantage in 
carrying on his work. 

II. THE TEACHER'S POSITION 

A. His Relation to the State 

A teacher who has been admitted to full standing in his 
profession is an officer of the French Republic. In conse- 
quence, his position is quite different from that occupied by 

1 This average does not include the time some of the teachers had spent in 
post-graduate work in a lycee; that is, in the rhetorique superieure. 

2 That is, the equivalent of four year-courses. 



1 86 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

a teacher who may be employed or discharged at the pleas- 
ure of local officials or local politicians. To begin with, 
the official relation somewhat restricts his activities, al- 
though it cannot be said that he is hampered at all in the 
discharge of his professional duties. He is not permitted, 
any more than other government officials, to engage in 
fundamentally unpatriotic practices or to bring seriously 
into question his loyalty to the nation he serves. On the 
other hand, he is protected. As long as he is competent, 
the government must find a position for him. If it does not, 
it must pay him his salary anyhow. Furthermore, he is 
protected from politics and petty machinations. He did 
not get into his profession through any political " pull," and 
he may not be dismissed save on grounds that are scrupu- 
lously meritorious. To be sure, local conditions may make 
it seem wise to change him from one school to another, but 
if his loyalty to France is unquestioned and he is a compe- 
tent teacher, he is assured of a position somewhere. 

B. His Standing in the Community 

The teacher's official character, combined with the fact 
that he really won his way into his profession, goes far in 
determining his standing in the community. He bears the 
approving stamp of the national government, and he has 
shown that he is not without a degree of intellectual strength, 
for has he not passed a long line of state examinations ? In 
that regard his standing is like that of civil-service physi- 
cians or engineers in our own country. His neighbors may 
not like the profession of teaching, and they may feel that 
the school is not accomplishing what it should, but they 
must admit that the teacher himself is a man of some attain- 
ments. He deserves and receives respect. 



THE FRENCH BOY'S TEACHER 187 

C. His Life Within the School 

But what, one may ask, is the teacher's life in the school 
itself ? Granted that he commands respect from his fellow 
citizens, does the school system make it possible for him to 
do effective work? 

Doubtless an American teacher would wish to know first 
of all about the relation of the teacher and the head of the 
school, that is, the person who corresponds to our superin- 
tendent or principal. Now, in order that the French 
teacher's position may be understood aright, it should be 
fixed in mind for all time that there is no one who corre- 
sponds exactly to our American town or city superintendent. 
The proviseur in the secondary school system and the 
directeur or directrice in the primary system have only a 
part of the superintendent's duties, and these are, in many 
respects, those duties which seem least important. The 
proviseur, who seems to the casual observer to approach the 
superintendent in official capacity, hears so many com- 
plaints and receives so many visitors that he might well be 
likened to a grade-school principal. It seemed to me some- 
times that making small " adjustments " was his chief 
business. Often as I sat in the waiting-room, the sound of 
stormy conversation made its way through the door; and 
in the course of the year, as I waited my turn to see pro- 
viseurs, I saw scores of weeping pupils, and almost as many 
angry, weeping parents, emerge submissively from the inner 
office. The proviseur in the smaller lycee has a personal 
acquaintance with most of his pupils, 1 and every proviseur 
seems to have a good working knowledge of his school. But 
his official relation to his teachers is quite another matter. 

1 One proviseur in a large lycee told me he was grieved to think that he 
really knew only half of his twenty-two hundred boys. 



1 88 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

It is never that of the employer to the employed, but rather 
that of a skilled business man toward a colleague who 
through the necessities of trade happens to be a scientific 
expert. He does not appoint teachers, or make recommen- 
dation that is equivalent to appointment, and he does not 
dismiss them. Given a certain body of workers — and it 
must be said that he is usually provided with a competent 
force — he is asked to smooth out the rough places in 
administration, bring his teachers into the best possible 
spirit for doing good work, and maintain a working relation 
with the parents. His duties may be summed up, I believe, 
in the words of one proviseur who has been very successful : 
" We have no authority except that which we assume, and 
we must be diplomats every day and all day long." 

The teacher, however, is not free from accountability to 
some immediate higher authority. This authority is the 
body of inspectors maintained as a part of the school system. 
At the top there are more than two dozen inspectors- 
general, 1 who cover the entire country for the Minister and 
report to him on the large aspects of education. Then there 
is in each of the eighty-six departements of the country one 
academie inspector who is directly responsible to the recteur 
of the academie of which the given departement forms a unit. 
Of course, neither the inspectors-general of primary educa- 
tion nor the academie inspectors can give a great deal of 
attention to the thousands of elementary schools in the 
primary system. For the making of personal observation 
and personal suggestion in these schools, each academie 
maintains a force of special primary inspectors. The 
teachers are directly responsible to these lowest inspectors; 

1 In secondary education there are fourteen: four in science, seven in 
letters, and three in modern languages. In primary education there are 
eleven. 



THE FRENCH BOY'S TEACHER 189 

these in turn to the academie inspectors; and these, through 
the recteur, to the Minister, who holds a check on both 
teachers and inspectors through his inspectors-general. 

This inspection, especially in the primary system, is 
exceedingly valuable, not only because the teachers receive 
many sound suggestions when the inspector makes his occa- 
sional visits, but because the mere existence of a well-trained 
inspector is stimulating to any teacher who has a degree of 
self-respect. Here is a man, he reasons, who is seeing 
school work every day. He knows, therefore, when work is 
well done. He will examine my record for the year, or 
some part of the year, he will study my classroom methods, 
he will test the progress my pupils have made, he will see 
whether I have carried out thearretes issued by the Minister, 
and his report will determine whether I receive the minimum 
or the maximum increase in salary next year. This is the 
attitude of the teacher. The good effect of inspection is 
increased too, by the fact that the inspector-general is, in a 
way, a disinterested observer. Inasmuch as regular pro- 
motion does not permit him to remain long in one place or 
have charge of one section of the country for a very long 
time, he has neither the desire nor the opportunity to build 
up a " machine." He can give his energy quite freely to 
carrying out the dictates of his best judgment. 

It cannot be said that a system of inspection of this kind 
robs a teacher of his individuality. It is true that in the 
secondary school system the academie inspector makes recom- 
mendations for all appointments, and that in the pri- 
mary system he recommends the appointment of stagiaires, 
the probationers in the profession, and that he has a share 
with the prefet in making out the roll of teachers for a given 
departement. Yet there is little opportunity for him to 
make a mere cog out of a teacher. All that he may demand 



190 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

is that the teacher do his work, and do it well. In the 
manner of doing it the teacher makes the fullest use of his 
own individuality and his own ingenuity. Even in the 
choice of textbooks, the teachers themselves, rather than 
any board or committee, make up the court of decision. 
Moreover, when a given textbook is pronounced good by 
teachers, it does not follow that a certain teacher must use 
this one book. Instead of an exclusive adoption there is an 
approved list from which a choice may be made. It is not 
unusual to see in publishers' catalogues a statement that 
such and such books are on the approved list in the city of 
Paris (or some other city) , when this approval seems to be a 
good advertisement for the book in other parts of the 
country. The teacher is not unduly restricted; but he is 
made to feel that his presence in the classroom must pro- 
duce a wholesome and permanent effect on the lives of his 
pupils. 

The average time actually spent in classroom work by the 
French teacher is materially shorter than the average in 
American schools. In the lower grades of the primary 
system, it is true, the hours are almost as many as in 
American schools; but the comparatively few hours re- 
quired in the secondary system serve to bring the average 
down. The maximum number of hours is fixed by law, and 
depends upon the subject and the grade in which the 
teaching is done. In the mother tongue, for example, a 
teacher of a class that corresponds to our eighth grade is 
required to teach fourteen hours a week. If emergency 
arises, he may be asked to teach not more than two addi- 
tional hours; but for this extra time he receives additional 
pay. In the study of representative groups of teachers 
referred to in an earlier part of this chapter, I found that the 
French secondary teachers of the mother tongue in what 



THE FRENCH BOY'S TEACHER 191 

would be our sixth, seventh, and eighth grades actually 
taught 14.6 hours a week; the American teachers of the 
same grades taught 26.2 hours. 

The French secondary school is built upon the conviction 
that a teacher cannot do his best work in the classroom 
unless he has time for self-improvement and recreation. 
Moreover, it is borne in mind that the teacher of the mother 
tongue has almost innumerable compositions to grade, and 
that he must do this work with some degree of deliberation. 
He has plenty to do. I did not find a teacher complaining 
about the discomforts of idleness. 1 But unless he chooses 
to earn additional money by taking some private pupils, he 
may have several hours of freedom each week. And best 
of all, this time is really his own. He can take the broader 
view of his future, and if he does not wish to turn at once 
to " producing something," he is at liberty to build a 
deep foundation for whatever he hopes to do when he is 
thoroughly mature. Fortunately, there is no committee on 
educational weights and measures pursuing him with ques- 
tions about what he works at before breakfast or how he and 
his family spend their Saturday afternoons. The organi- 
zation of the lycee, moreover, makes it unnecessary for him 
to serve on many purely administrative committees. He is 
expected to bring full knowledge and inspiration to his 
classes and to direct the pupils' work effectively. He may 
do more if he chooses; but more is not required of him. 

D. Salaries 

The salaries of French teachers are not high; but they 
are, I believe, higher than they are usually thought to be. 

1 One school official told me that he believed some teachers would do 
better work if they were required do more teaching. I am sure, however, 
that the number in that class is very small. 



1 92 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

In the primary system the teacher receives a salary proper 
ranging from noo francs (roughly $220) to 4100 francs 
($800); he is provided with a house for himself and his 
family, and the law specifies in detail what this house shall 
be; and if he lives in a town or city of more than a thousand 
inhabitants, he receives what is known as a residential 
indemnity, ranging from 100 francs to 800 francs according 
to the size of the town or city, to offset the prevailing higher 
prices. 1 This total compensation seems wholly inadequate 
when it is viewed in relation to the service rendered ; for the 
primary teachers, notably in the middle grades, do their 
work with great faithfulness and skill. But when one 
remembers that the salary, house, and residential indemnity 
are absolutely certain, and that the teacher, as we shall see, 
receives a pension when he is too old to work, it is possible 
to understand why he continues in the profession. He is 
not quite so badly off as he at first appears. 

In the secondary system the teacher is distinctly more 
fortunate. Salaries for teachers in full standing range 
from 4200 francs (for beginners) to 6200 in the provinces, 
with an additional 400 in Lyon, Marseille, and Bordeaux; 
and from 6000 to 9500 2 francs in Paris. These amounts, 
unlike the salaries in the primary system, represent all that 
the teacher receives, unless he does the hours of extra work 

1 See Pichard's Code de I'Instruction primaire (edition of 1912), pp. 314 
ff., 680 f., and 340 f. for the schedules of salaries, the specifications for houses, 
and the scale of indemnities. At the outbreak of the present European war 
the salaries of teachers in both school systems were the center of much dis- 
cussion in the newspapers. Many secondary teachers felt that they suffered 
in comparison with officers in the army, and the primary teachers complained 
of the system of promotion. 

2 Only a few go beyond 8500 francs. Those who receive more than this 
amount are called hors classe. The schedule of salaries down to iqio may be 
found in Wissemans's Code de V Enseignement secondaire (edition of 1910). 
There have been some increases since that time. 



THE FRENCH BOY'S TEACHER 193 

referred to in a preceding paragraph. But inasmuch as the 
amounts are fixed by law and do not represent any fictitious 
scale that is applied only in a few special cases, the teachers 
are in reasonably good circumstances in so far as ordinary 
comforts are concerned. 

In studying the representative groups of teachers already 
referred to, I secured definite information about salaries. 
The grades studied were the sixth, seventh, and eighth, 
with the corresponding grades in the lycees, and in every 
case the teachers reported upon taught the mother tongue. 
The superintendents were free to choose any schools in their 
cities, provided only that they reported on all the teachers 
in a given school who taught the mother tongue in these 
grades. Although the salaries received by teachers in 
representative New York City schools were higher than 
those received anywhere in France, those received by the 
French teachers in the smaller towns so far exceeded what 
the teacher in the small American town received that the 
average for the French teachers was actually higher than 
that for the Americans. For the groups of French teachers 
the average was $1094.50; for the Americans, $798. 1 

It is true that a comparison of this kind would not hold 
so advantageously in favor of the French teacher if the 

1 It is amusing to hear the European discuss American salaries. He 
seems to believe that most Americans are millionaires, and that while teachers 
may not be, they must be exceedingly well-to-do. One writer in a Paris 
daily paper recently declared that American secondary teachers received 
more than 25,000 francs ($5000) a year. His evidence, I learned, was the 
testimony of an American who had not explained to him the difference be- 
tween an American college, included in a university, and a French college, 
which is theoretically the same kind of institution as a lycee but is really 
below it in rank. And even then, how many American college teachers 
receive $5000 a year ? This writer, of course, did not know that the average 
salary for teachers in a large number of small high schools in the United 
States is scarcely $600. For a study of salaries in the state of Indiana, see 
the School Review, vol. 21, p. 446 (September, 1913). 



194 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

classes chosen were higher in the school course. American 
high-school teachers usually receive larger salaries than the 
teachers of the middle and upper grades of the same town or 
city, while in the French lycee, above the elementary classes, 
teachers with the same training, experience, and success 
receive the same salaries regardless of the grades in which 
they work. The French teacher, however, has the distinct 
advantage of knowing that his salary is assured year after 
year, and he is saved from seeing the least skilled laborer 
receiving a wage higher than his own. 

The teacher, moreover, always has a higher salary held 
clearly before him. His promotion may not be rapid, and it 
may not carry him to the highest-salaried class of all, but 
some advancement is sure to come. If he shows marked 
skill, he is likely to receive the maximum increase in the 
minimum time. If he is just a good, substantial teacher 
without special ability, the increase will come slowly, but it 
will come, sooner or later. Theinspector's recommendation 
may hasten a teacher's promotion, and it may carry him 
without unnecessary delay to the highest classification; but 
some advancement is provided for by law merely on the 
ground that the teacher continues to teach. If he is good 
enough to remain in the service, it is argued, he is good 
enough to have some increase in salary as he advances 
in years. 1 

E. Pensions 

The French teacher is encouraged in his work, too, by the 
assurance of a pension at the end of his active career. In 
the primary system, if a teacher has been in active service 
for twenty-five years and is fifty-five years of age, he retires 

1 In the secondary system the proportion between service and the recom- 
mendation of the inspector is fixed. It is: service, eighty-five per cent; 
choice of the inspector, fifteen per cent. 



THE FRENCH BOY'S TEACHER 195 

on a pension for the rest of his life. When he begins to 
teach, he pays into a government fund one-twelfth of his ini- 
tial salary, and during his service, five per cent of the salary 
he receives annually. The additions, too, in his successive 
promotions are subject to the initial tax of one-twelfth. 
Then, when he retires, he receives annually from this fund 
one-half of the average salary he received during the best 
six years of his career. And if, in addition to his regular 
salary, he received during these years any other emoluments 
that were subject to assessment for the pension fund, his 
pension is increased in due proportion. 1 In the secondary 
school system the provision for pensions is in all its larger 
aspects the same, save that the pension is based on the last 
six years of a teacher's service, whether or not they are the 
ones commanding the highest salary, and that the teacher 
may not retire until after he has taught thirty years and has 
attained the age of sixty. 2 In either system, if he teaches 
more than the number of years fixed by law, his pension is 
correspondingly higher when he does withdraw from service. 
In the primary system, each additional year adds one- 
fiftieth to his pension; in the secondary system, one-sixtieth. 
In both systems, too, provision is made for pensioning the 
widows and orphans of teachers. If a teacher leaves a 
widow who was married to him at least six years before his 
death, she is eligible to a part of his pension; and if for any 
reason she is not eligible, or if she is eligible but dies, the 
teacher's orphans receive the pension that otherwise would 
have been paid to the widow. 

1 See Pichard's Code de I' Instruction primaire for the full text of the laws 
here summarized. The page references are too numerous to cite. See pp. 
899 ff. (edition of 191 2) for an index to the laws. 

2 See Wissemans's Code de V ' Enseignement secondaire, under the index head- 
ing " Pensions civiles," pp. 398 ff. (edition of 1910). 



196 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

The French teacher, then, especially in the secondary and 
the higher primary schools, occupies a position that enables 
him to do effective work comfortably. He holds an official 
position that is important in the eyes of the national govern- 
ment; he teaches in a system that is at once exacting and 
stimulating; and the guarantee of an income for life if he 
performs his duty faithfully enables him to face the future 
with a degree of calm. Certainly he may not be a " leading 
citizen " whose name and likeness appear prominently in the 
newspapers every day; and he receives little of the nervous 
honor that is bestowed upon the man of public affairs. But 
he is enabled to take the larger, longer view of work that 
such a comprehensive subject as the mother tongue insist- 
ently demands. He need not hesitate to make thorough 
preparation for teaching, since thorough preparation re- 
ceives unquestioned recognition; and he may use his own 
best judgment in enriching his life so that his teaching may 
become more and more effective through the power of 
stimulating suggestion. 

\J III. PROFESSIONAL CHARACTERISTICS OF THE 
TEACHER 

It might be inferred from the rather wide differences 
between the primary and secondary schools that there 
would be two fairly distinct classes of teachers in the nation. 
In most respects, however, the classes are not sharply 
marked. It is true that the instituteur in the lower primary 
schools frequently wears an expression of grim determina- 
tion to hold on to life and respectability that is quite in 
contrast with the air of the prosperous-looking professeur in 
the secondary schools; yet so many of these differences may 
be observed within either one of the school systems that it is 
difficult to say that certain professional characteristics 



THE FRENCH BOY'S TEACHER 197 

belong exclusively to the one or the other. And the dif- 
ferences that do exist are scarcely noticeable when one 
compares the secondary teachers with those in the higher 
primary schools. Moreover, the younger generations of 
teachers in the two systems seem much more alike than the 
older generations. Whether this means that the differences 
are disappearing or that time and the heavier hours in the 
primary system have not yet had their full effect, I do not 
know. But even where the differences are most pronounced, 
the important characteristics are so much the same in 
both systems that we may safely consider the two groups 
together. 

A hasty or casual view might lead one to believe that 
nothing distinguishes the French teacher. He goes about 
his work with so much of an air of doing what is inevitable 
and taken for granted, that one is in danger of missing the 
essential strength of his teaching. Observation in a large 
number of schools, however, is sure to give outline and dis- 
tinctness to certain characteristic qualities and practices 
that are powerful in their ultimate effect upon the pupil's 
mind. 

A. Conscientiousness 

In the first place, the fact that the French teacher is 
distinctly a member of a well-established profession gives 
him a conscientiousness and a feeling of responsibility that 
must almost inevitably be lacking in a teacher who expects 
to turn his attention to some other calling after a year or 
two. Instead of being a young man who very studiously 
devotes all of his money and vacations to preparation for the 
practice of law or medicine, or the pursuit of business, he is 
expecting to be a teacher always. " Here I am," he says, 
" a public servant engaged in a responsible calling, and I 
shall follow it all the days of my life. I must, therefore, 



198 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

make myself just as good a teacher as I can, and I must do 
my work so that it will bring me promotion and professional 
credit." The more remunerative position that he hopes to 
merit next year or some time later, the plan of his work for 
next term, the compositions that he must return to his 
pupils to-morrow, the success of his boys in their state 
examinations and in the work they will do after the examina- 
tions are over, — some of these matters seem ever to be in 
his mind. He is, too, extremely self-critical and likely to 
minimize the effectiveness of his own work, although he is 
singularly sensitive to the criticism of his colleagues. And 
once he has established his educational ideals, he clings to 
them with religious fervor. It is for this reason, I believe, 
that the French teacher is sometimes understood to be 
dogmatic. He cannot, however, quite be charged with 
dogmatism. Dogmatism usually implies either insufficient 
knowledge of the question in hand or an unreceptive state of 
mind. The French teacher usually thinks seriously about 
methods and aims before he accepts them, and he is quite 
open-minded, as some of the sweeping educational changes 
of the past few decades will bear witness. But he is not 
much given to the pursuit of fads, and he does not throw the 
old aside unless he is convinced beyond doubt that the new is 
better. His state of preoccupation is usually not antago- 
nism to things proposed, but loyalty to something already 
accepted as essential to the success of his labors. 

B. Enthusiasm 

The most significant of the other characteristics center 
about the teacher's one great desire to create in the pupil a 
permanent state of mental activity. He is an enthusiastic 
teacher. Faults he may have, sometimes abundantly, but 
he does not suffer from a passive or indifferent attitude. 



THE FRENCH BOY'S TEACHER 199 

Not even in the highest classes in the lycee did I see any 
teacher droning along sleepily and dryly. There is no 
feverish haste, yet the alertness is noteworthy. The 
teacher seems to believe that any sin is less grievous than 
inactivity and dullness; and he sets a good example through 
his own enthusiasm, his own apparent delight in his work. 

C. Ability to Question 

Again, the teacher seems to have mastered the art of 
questioning. The indolent boy who does not catch the 
spirit of the classroom when he enters is brought quickly 
to recognize his condition by means of the questions the 
teacher is almost certain to direct to every part of the 
room at the beginning of the hour. It should not be under- 
stood that the recitation is wholly questions and answers; 
there is textbook study and there is abundant explanation 
by the teacher. But in the course of a recitation, the 
teacher succeeds marvelously in asking every boy several 
questions. Sometimes the question is put to the entire 
class, and then some pupil is called upon to answer. Some- 
times a pupil is requested to rise and then is not 
only asked one question, but is pursued with many 
until the teacher is absolutely certain that one pupil at 
least has a thorough knowledge of the lesson. Fre- 
quently, too, some other pupil is suddenly called upon to 
make corrections in a classmate's responses or to catch up 
the train of thought and carry it farther. Or, again, some 
pupil — or perhaps the entire class — is by means of 
questioning led about the subject in a way designed espe- 
cially to encourage reflection. In some manner the teacher 
usually puts four or five or six boys through the more 
thorough-going test each hour, and manages, as I have 
already said, to ask the other pupils enough questions 



200 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

to prevent their minds from wandering away from their 
work. 

Usually teachers insist upon immediate responses. When 
I first visited classrooms it seemed to me that pupils had 
not time enough to make well-considered replies; and I still 
feel that teachers ought to ask more questions demanding 
leisurely reflection. Yet I came to see how valuable the 
rapid-fire questioning is in holding attention, developing the 
power of using one's vocabulary without hesitation, and 
fixing important knowledge in mind. The boy must see 
the subject from all sides, and he must exercise the power 
of recalling images and ideas. He is, then, immediately 
put on the road to easy memorizing. He is encour- 
aged, moreover, to question himself, so that life will not cease 
to be interesting as soon as his teacher is out of sight. 
The entire procedure is at once stimulating and corrective. 
A boy is encouraged to take mental exercise — and this the 
normal boy enjoys — yet because of the limitations he dis- 
covers in his own knowledge, he is kept in a fruitfully 
humble state of mind. 

It must be admitted that the French teacher is aided in 
developing interest in this manner by the naive, boyish 
kind of curiosity that is characteristic of his race. This is 
not simply the intellectual curiosity supposed to belong to 
intelligent adults, but the desire to look upon, and perhaps 
marvel at, anything that is in any manner beyond the com- 
monplace. And sometimes one wonders if the commonplace 
also should not be included. An example quite apart from 
teachers and schools will make my meaning clear. One 
morning I saw a crowd of two or three hundred people out 
in the middle of a boulevard completely surrounding one of 
the tree lawns. I supposed that an autobus had collided 
with a taxicab, or that an automobile had run over some 



THE FRENCH BOY'S TEACHER 201 

pedestrian. When I came up I pushed my way through 
the crowd, but saw nothing save two or three feet of crushed 
wr ought-iron fence, the low fence surrounding a mound of 
flowers. I learned from some one near me that an auto- 
mobile had slipped on the wet pavement earlier in the morn- 
ing and had skidded into the fence. There was very little 
talking among the onlookers; they were simply gazing in 
curious wonder. The next day I passed again, and a 
crowd almost as large as that of the day before surrounded 
the spot. Workmen, messenger boys, laundry women, 
housemaids, men who wore high hats and carried sticks, 
and smartly dressed ladies stopped, crossed over from the 
sidewalk, looked for two or three minutes, perhaps asked a 
question, and then went on their way. On the following 
Monday, I chanced to pass along the boulevard again and 
still a fairly good-sized crowd looked at the broken fence. 
And even three or four days later when the red first-coat of 
paint on the new section stood out in contrast with the 
black paint on the old, a cluster of men and women stood 
looking on. This curiosity, usually amusing to foreigners 
who are in France, and usually regarded by Americans as a 
distinctly rural characteristic, unquestionably helps the 
French teacher whenever he unfolds a subject so that the 
exercise partakes of the nature of exploration. 

D. Skill in Incidental Teaching 

Finally, the French teacher is skilled in what might be 
called incidental teaching. In classes corresponding to our 
first-year or second-year college courses he sometimes lec- 
tures, and in the lower grades he ordinarily uses a textbook; 
but he has the background that inevitably makes his lec- 
tures informal and half recitation, and draws him away from 
the hard, unbending plan of a book. His training, to begin 



202 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

with, has provided him with a fund of reserve knowledge 
that makes it possible to turn aside from the fixed path. 
He need not feel afraid. Furthermore, his maturity and his 
teaching experience have acquainted him with most of the 
situations he will probably encounter in his work. How 
mature he is likely to be may be seen by referring once more 
to the comparative study I made of groups of French and 
American teachers. The French teachers had an average 
of 21.3 years of experience. 1 

Now this deep background of knowledge and experience 
is valuable in the teaching of any subject, but especially in 
the teaching of the mother tongue. After the fundamentals 
in either composition or literature have become thoroughly 
familiar to the pupil, it is not only deadening but positively 
ruinous for him to try to make progress simply by following 
stereotyped directions. The teacher must make comments 
to supplement the good counsel of the textbook ; he must 
make pointed, stimulating suggestions in the criticism of 
papers; he must illuminate the lesson in grammar with 
comparisons and contrasts drawn from his knowledge of the 
historical development of the language; he must make 
comparisons with the literature of other times or even other 
peoples; and when he takes up the systematic study of the 
text, he must vitalize and color the outline with his own 
spontaneous observations. I do not mean to say that every 
teacher one sees in the French schools lives up to this ideal; 
but the comparative fitness of most teachers to offer an 
abundance of incidental instruction must inevitably excite 
admiration. 

1 It is not difficult to account for this high average. (1) Comparatively 
few French teachers leave the profession while they are young. (2) The popu- 
lation of the country does not increase rapidly enough to demand the opening 
of many wholly new schools; so young teachers are needed only to fill 
vacancies. 



THE FRENCH BOY'S TEACHER 203 

IV. THE TEACHER AND HIS SCHOOL 

The spirit of the school over which this teacher presides 
may be summed up in three words, — respect, impartiality, 
and seriousness. The respect which characterizes the 
young pupil's conduct is so deep-seated, so thoroughly a part 
of school life, that it is scarcely possible to conceive of its 
absence. The teacher does not hold himself aloof from his 
pupils; he is sincere, he is sympathetic, and he is generous. 
But he never assumes the role of playfellow. In the class- 
room, even in the warmest, most spontaneous discussions in 
which the pupils may engage, if they have occasion to speak 
against an opinion held by the teacher or to question a posi- 
tion that he has taken, there is usually in their manner clear 
evidence of the fact that he is their teacher and not a fellow 
pupil or some friendly acquaintance. And outside the 
classroom, the same spirit prevails. The teachers walk 
about in the courts where the boys are playing, they watch 
them kick footballs, play tennis, or roll one another in the 
gravel, and they seem to enter into the spirit of the play. 
Yet if a boy thinks of something about which he wishes to 
speak to his teacher, he not only lifts his cap when he 
approaches, but he shows by his entire attitude that he is 
addressing a person who deserves repect. The teacher 
seems not to take unfair advantage of this attitude; he 
merely takes it for granted. He enjoys association with his 
pupils, he takes delight in their progress, and he sympathizes 
with them in their youthful schemes and castle-building. 
Moreover, they may love him so genuinely that they will 
enter a spirited protest when his promotion takes him to 
another school. Yet the bond that binds them is never that 
of equals, as may be true with our very young teachers and 
very oldest pupils, but instead, that of the wise man and the 



204 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

inexperienced youth, — the inexperienced youth who would 
get wisdom. 

Quite naturally, this respectful attitude is not so pro- 
nounced in the upper classes of the lycee. Young men of 
sixteen or seventeen are beginning to feel their importance 
to the world, they are beginning to place value on their own 
opinions, and they sometimes consider grievances so 
seriously that they resort to petitions and strikes. Yet in 
their personal relations with their teachers they reveal 
surprisingly little of the attitude of condescending tolerance. 
Either through youthful choice or through the fact that their 
teachers are mature men who will command respect if they 
do not receive it voluntarily, they prefer, in the main, to be 
respectful. 

The spirit of impartiality, though less evident upon first 
observation, is equally prevalent. It manifests itself 
first in what might be called the social relations of the 
teacher and pupil. Under the Republic, the teacher is 
expected to have no social favorites. This equality of 
pupils before the educational law is illustrated in a national 
statute, nearly two decades old, that makes it an offense for 
a teacher to accept gifts of any sort from his pupils. The 
theory, evidently, is that there must not be even a suspicion 
of favoritism. But this ordinary fairness is a less pro- 
nounced characteristic than the larger, less definite kind of 
impartiality. The pupil seems to be living in an atmos- 
phere that is constantly bearing in on him the fact that 
however much he may be mistreated or favored elsewhere 
in the world, here is one place where he is measured accord- 
ing to unvarying standards. Perhaps the long line of 
examinations conducted by the national government helps 
to give the school this tone; a timid teacher would certainly 
be sustained by the assurance that any fundamental or 



THE FRENCH BOY'S TEACHER 205 

extensive favoritism on his part would sooner or later come 
to light in the work of his pupils. But whether this be in 
any degree the explanation, it remains true that the boy 
accepts the situation as inevitable, and sooner or later 
comes to understand that if the standards are troublesome, 
it is he, not the standards, that is at fault. He has the 
abiding satisfaction of feeling that in school, at least, his 
work is not being overestimated. 

The one characteristic of the schools, however, that im- 
presses an American more deeply than any other is serious- 
ness of intent. Even in the lowest classes the hours spent 
in the schoolroom are serious hours; and they become more 
so as the pupils advance in the grades. This seriousness is 
not gravity. There is nothing long-faced in the life of the 
school. The boys push one another into the mud, throw 
one another's hats into the tree-tops, wrestle, fight, and 
engage in all the other activities that are generally supposed 
to be invigorating and wholesome in a boy's life. Further- 
more, there is within the classroom no deathlike quiet. 1 In 
truth, I visited many classes where there seemed to me to be 
unnecessary noise. And when I returned to America and 
had occasion immediately to visit a number of grade schools, 
this impression was deepened. The " order " in the 
American schools was better, and such movements as enter- 
ing the room after play or going to the gymnasium or 

1 The discipline is firm, but not heartless. " Won't you forgive me ? " 
asked a ten-year-old boy of his teacher at the end of the hour when the 
teacher had punished him by assigning him five additional exercises for the 
next day. " I didn't mean to be a bad boy." 

" Well, I might forgive you," the teacher replied, " but you see we had a 
visitor, and you disturbed him also." 

The little fellow then turned to me and asked eagerly: " Won't you for- 
give me ? Won't you save me from five hard exercises ? " 

" They are not bad boys," the teacher remarked as the happy youngster 
rushed from the room, " but I must be firm with them," 



206 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

assembly hall were executed with greater precision and less 
disturbance. But there was also less work. The French 
boy understands that he is to do something of some con- 
sequence as soon as he enters the schoolroom. Whether 
there is noise or not, there must be mental activity. Work, 
much work, much more work than the American schoolboy 
does, is taken for granted. A boy may be slow or mis- 
chievous, and for one of these reasons fail to make as much 
progress as some of his fellows, but while he is in the class- 
room, whatever his ability, he must have his mind in 
motion concerning the business in hand. 

This spirit of work is increased by the fact that school 
life is comparatively free from distracting influences. 
Outdoor sports, though in evidence everywhere and though 
increasing in popularity, have not taken on the highly 
organized character of American interscholastic and inter- 
collegiate athletics. Again, the presence of only one sex in 
the school, that is, wherever small enrollment or some other 
local condition does not make coeducation necessary, gives 
the pupil in the upper grades more time for thinking about 
work while he is in the school building, and it saves him 
from the mental weariness occasioned by scores of class 
parties, surreptitious automobile rides after school, and 
numerous school dances. His social life is not indissolubly 
woven into his school life so that he cannot think of school 
without thinking of party. In so far as his social life exists 
— and he has much less of it than the American boy has — 
it is, in the main, the outgrowth of acquaintanceships 
formed through family calls and visits, family receptions, or 
other relations quite apart from the everyday life of the 
school. The pupil, then, while he is in the classroom is 
certain not to have " society " so borne in upon him that 
he finds it impossible to fix his attention upon work. 



THE FRENCH BOY'S TEACHER 207 

I would not have the reader believe, even momentarily, 
that I have forgotten the significance of a wholesome spirit 
to all school studies. But as I have already pointed out, 
the teacher and the tone of the school life have a peculiarly 
strong influence on the pupil's mastery of the mother tongue. 
Because of the very nature of composition and literature 
there is a demand that the teacher have broad training; 
there is an equally insistent demand for favorable conditions 
under which to teach the subject; there is need of sound 
pedagogical practice and a sympathetic nature to keep the 
pupil in a receptive state of mind; and there is need of the 
most rigid insistence on high standards while the pupil is 
forming his language habits. If a pupil is fortunate enough 
to have a teacher who is not only well trained but well 
fitted personally to do his work, other subjects will profit; 
but the mother tongue will profit immeasurably. 



CHAPTER VIII 

ORGANIZED LANGUAGE TRADITION 
I. ORGANIZED TRADITION IN FRANCE 
Among those who do not hold strongly to the belief that the 
French boy writes well because his native language is an 
exceptionally perfect medium of expression, it is somewhat 
the fashion to say that his skill is due to good language 
tradition. As far as it goes, this explanation is sound; but 
to go no farther would result in a serious misinterpretation 
of the facts. As Brunetiere has pointed out somewhere, the 
literary classes of France long ago recognized the possibili- 
ties of influence through speech and writing; and they set 
themselves, accordingly, to the task of making their native 
language a powerful force in the world. Their effort, how- 
ever, might not have resulted in a permanent, pronounced 
influence outside of literary circles had there been no means 
of disseminating their conviction among a large proportion 
of the French people. The schools served as the necessary 
means; and during the nineteenth century when the educa- 
tional systems were developing most rapidly, this care for 
language that had been cherished before by a part of the 
people came to be the ideal of the nation at large. To-day, 
then, despite the many distractions in educational life, the 
French schools stand as a deeply established safeguard to 
the better use of the mother tongue. The so-called dis- 
integrating tendencies in language exist in France as in 
other countries of the world just now, but they meet with a 
stronger, more perfectly organized resistance. 

The effect of the schools on language tradition is not 
difficult to comprehend. The programmes of study pre- 



ORGANIZED LANGUAGE TRADITION 209 

scribe a course that requires the pupil to think continuously 
in the field of language and literature for a long period of 
years; and the organization of the educational system is so 
close that there is little opportunity to miss any essential 
part of this course. Then, in carrying out the programmes, 
the insistence that the pupil improve his vocabulary, 
master the mechanics of expression, practice observation, 
imagination, and reflection, learn to organize material and 
criticise his own work, become skilled in the grammatical 
structure of the sentence, know how to find out what an 
author says and how to read an author's works aloud, 
develop the memory and store it with good literature, and 
strengthen his grasp of his own literature by accurate study 
of foreign tongues, — the insistence upon all these things by 
a teacher who is well trained, not only in academic subjects 
but in the art of teaching, cannot fail to be instrumental in 
maintaining respect for language. 

As was pointed out in Chapter I, the strongest evidence 
that the mother tongue in France is relatively safe against 
what we vaguely call " the modern " in education is the 
fact that nothing can be proposed that seems in any way to 
touch unfavorably the instruction in the native language, 
without calling forth warnings and protests against a 
" crisis." All the spirited, often bitter discussion between 
the champions of the Classics and the champions of modern 
languages and science during the past decade or more has 
been in very large part, probably even in the main, a discus- 
sion of whether the new programmes would not render 
impossible the highest and best kind of instruction in the 
mother tongue. I met many teachers of science who ex- 
pressed the utmost enthusiasm for their subjects who yet 
declared that if it could be demonstrated that Latin was 
essential to the best teaching of French, then they would be 



210 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

unalterably in favor of retaining Latin. This view repre- 
sents the seriousness with which the people consider the 
question of their own tongue; and it indicates a small part 
of the resistance that must be overcome before it is fashion- 
able for the French boy to write inaccurately. 

I would urge again that I do not wish to hold up French 
schools as being admirable in every respect. They might 
profitably be modified in a number of directions. The 
French could, moreover, learn much about some problems 
in education (ventilation, for example) by studying what 
we have accomplished in America. But one thing they 
have done : they have held to the conviction that whatever 
else the school should stand for, it should be the exponent of 
good French. The organization of the system and the 
character of the instruction given in the schools have 
together borne this conviction to every corner of the country 
and to every social class. It may be seen, then, that good 
language tradition does not merely exist as tradition in 
spite of some vague " spirit of the times," but instead is 
organized, made not only defensive but positive, through the 
national system of education. 

II. THE LACK OF ORGANIZED TRADITION IN AMERICA 

When we turn to America, if we consider our country as a 
whole, we find that tradition in favor of good language is 
very feeble. Moreover, what little exists is not thoroughly 
enough organized in our schools to make its perpetuation 
and growth unquestionably sure. We are so young, in 
truth, and we are so busy with the immediate business of 
subduing a continent and developing its natural resources, 
that we have little intellectual or artistic background of any 
kind. As a consequence, the teacher of English finds his 
problems extremely numerous and difficult. The teacher 



ORGANIZED LANGUAGE TRADITION 211 

in the high school, for instance, must not only deal with 
the very definite problem before him in the shape of boys 
who cannot spell, who not only know no grammar but hate 
the word itself, and who cannot give adequate expression to 
the few thoughts and vague feelings that save their minds 
from emptiness, but he must struggle, and he must help his 
pupils to struggle, against the overwhelming flood of 
incorrect, inaccurate, sometimes absolutely vicious speech 
that tyrannizes the community. Every day the pupil in the 
public schools probably hears scores of men who take pride 
in " butchering " the language, and who regard correctness 
or elegance of speech as a feminine affectation. Moreover, 
he looks about him and sees millionaires who say " have 
went," he hears millionaires' wives say " to he and John," 
and he hears ministers, lawyers, judges, and members of 
Congress say " you was " and " would of." So when he 
is assured from the desk that people of consequence do 
not disregard established grammatical usage, he is likely 
to think that teachers of English, as well as grammars, 
are only unnecessary hindrances to personal liberty and 
the free play of one's intellectual powers. And it is 
not wholly improbable that he will find some justifica- 
tion of his views in the expressed doctrines and everyday 
practices of teachers of other subjects. Furthermore, if he 
should move to another school, or if a new teacher of English 
should come to the one he attends, he would encounter so 
many new ideals, and so many new grammatical and rhe- 
torical names, that he would be convinced beyond question 
that English is only a bugbear, and that it can have no en- 
during importance like manual training, agriculture, football, 
or " school spirit." He does not encounter anywhere an 
unyielding conviction in favor of careful, thoughtful speech 
and writing. 



212 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

III. ADJUSTMENTS NECESSARY TO ORGANIZED 
TRADITION 

If, now, we are to train boys and girls to speak and write 
well, we must do more toward developing a literary con- 
science and we must fortify it by making our schools con- 
tribute directly and continuously to its sensitiveness and its 
strength. The task is a great one; but we can perform it if 
we undertake it with high seriousness, unselfishness, and 
patience. There is nothing in the character of what the 
French have done that we cannot do. They have chosen 
to be influential through their speech and writing. We, 
down to the present time, have chosen to be influential in 
other ways. In our rapid commercial development we have 
needed typewriters, and we have built the best ones in the 
world; we have had strong business competition in the 
making of textbooks, and these, from a mechanical or artis- 
tic point of view, are beyond comparison with the textbooks 
of other countries; we have needed libraries and stupendous 
railway stations, and into some of these we have put the 
best architecture of the age. We are not without any 
essential aptitude that may be necessary in learning to 
write; and we shall learn, at least to write with reasonable 
correctness and a degree of force, as soon as we turn our 
energy in that direction. 

In order to make real progress in the teaching of the 
mother tongue, we must begin on solid, open ground. We 
must accept the situation as it is, we must make no effort to 
conceal or disguise its less agreeable aspects, and we must 
set about the solution of our many problems with minds 
that are open and free from pedagogical hypocrisy. Every 
teacher, too, must be willing to bear his share of the respon- 
sibility for conditions as they exist to-day, or may exist 



ORGANIZED LANGUAGE TRADITION 213 

to-morrow. This is difficult. We seem to be in the grip of 
a national malady that drives us to attribute undesirable 
results of every kind to causes that are beyond our control. 
Railroad wrecks grow out of the negligence of the engineer 
who was killed; bad schools are the result of bad homes; 
and bad writing is caused by some lower-grade teacher's 
negative influence — which, of course, cannot now be 
changed — or possibly by some singular neglect on the part 
of the Creator. Now, if we are unable to meet our prob- 
lems squarely, or if we are unwilling to believe that condi- 
tions can actually be made better by conscientious struggle, 
we ought to resign as teachers of English, for we are 
securing money under false pretenses. We must welcome 
the opportunity to labor, and we must welcome any sug- 
gestion whatever that will make our labor more effective. 

A. In Our Educational System 

The first adjustment that suggests itself, though not the 
one that seems to touch the writing of English most in- 
timately, is in the organization of our school system. Our 
schools are not organized to make good work in English 
easily possible. To begin with, the present rigid division 
into grade school, high school, and college, with each 
exercising such large liberty that it may almost be said to 
disregard the others, is not designed to secure the cooper- 
ation necessary in presenting such a delicately balanced 
group of subjects as constitute the course in the mother 
tongue. It does not contribute to good language habits. 
Instead of complete understanding and complete sympathy 
among all the teachers that a boy works under from the 
time he enters school until he is a college graduate, or even a 
college freshman, there is usually a spirit of narrow inde- 
pendence, and quite frequently, an attitude of open antago- 



214 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

nism. The grade-school teacher says the high-school 
teacher forgets that it is necessary to meet the needs of the 
boy who drops out of school at the end of the eighth grade; 
the high-school teacher lays his pupils' sins at the door of 
the grade teacher, and then talks about the " domination " 
of the colleges; and the college teacher in his turn looks 
with scorn on high schools that graduate boys who cannot 
really be said to speak or write the English language. 

Added to this confusion is the serious difficulty that 
results from trying to put all pupils, regardless of their 
aptitudes, their interests, or their purpose in going to school, 
into one rigid course of study. This is not done, to be sure, 
in the larger, better-equipped high schools, but it is done in 
the smaller high schools and in most grade schools. There 
is no adequate provision, such as the French have in the 
primary school system, for the boy who must seize upon a 
large number of essentials before he drops out of school to 
begin work at the age of fourteen or fifteen. Not only does 
the American boy who has like interests and who holds to the 
same purpose fail to get these essentials, but because he is 
often out of sympathy with the more deliberate mental 
habits of the boys and girls who expect to go to high school 
and college, he does not really get what the course, as it 
stands, offers to him. He is guided, without regard for his 
interests or economic needs, into the first work of the Eng- 
lish course of study. Then school and college officials 
pray that luck may bring him out somewhere along the 
way in possession of enough skill to save himself and his 
teachers from disgrace. If he fails to have it, everybody 
blames somebody else. 

My conviction is this: we cannot have the best results 
until a more genuine respect for the actual needs of others 
dominates our work. There must be a better working 



ORGANIZED LANGUAGE TRADITION 215 

relation between the lowest and the highest grades. Teach- 
ing the mother tongue will remain in a chaotic state until 
we have begun to accomplish definite things in definite 
places; and as long as the lower-grade teacher, the high- 
school teacher, and the college professor disregard one 
another, this end is unattainable. In our present state, it is 
impossible to fix responsibility in any given case. Now 
the remedy does not call for an ideal boy or an ideal teacher. 
All that is needed is a cooperative spirit and a course that is 
definitely planned and definitely carried out, so that when a 
boy has passed through a certain grade in the kind of 
school best suited to his needs, he will possess certain 
knowledge and certain skill — limited, of course, by his 
native capacity — which the teachers in succeeding grades 
may confidently take for granted. 

In the second place, if we are not to give up the more or 
less distinct breaks that separate the grades and the high 
school, and the high school and the college, let us have them 
earlier in the pupil's life. The subject-matter in most 
seventh-grade and eighth-grade courses in English naturally 
relates itself more closely to what comes after it than to what 
precedes it. If, then, the pupil is to come to a point in his 
school career where he takes a new and firmer grasp upon 
his work, let it come where the subject-matter of the course 
makes a division most nearly logical. 

Moreover, if the demands of the native tongue are con- 
sidered, the entire school course ought to be simplified and 
compressed. Good writing, as well as good speaking, is 
largely a matter of habit; and habits are more permanently 
formed when the mind is alert, receptive, and so disen- 
cumbered of non-essentials that it feels its own progress. 
When the pupil's entire mental life is warmed by means of 
continuous, concentrated activity, he thinks more clearly, 



216 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

sees relations more distinctly, and is impressed by the world 
about him to a greater degree than is possible when he must 
be constantly reawakened. And this advantage holds 
whether the pupil expects to go to college or to turn at once 
to earning a livelihood. If he purposes to go directly from 
high school to an office or shop, his habits of speech or 
writing will profit by the stricter and more constant atten- 
tion resulting from a compression of the school course; and 
if he purposes to go to college, not only will he have this 
advantage, but he will probably be a better freshman at 
sixteen or seventeen than at eighteen or nineteen. At the 
earlier age, he is much less likely to have become so en- 
grossed in social activities that he " slows down " in his work. 
He will, then, probably enter college with better habits of 
study if he pursues a well-filled course that brings him 
through high school without a long period of mental relax- 
ation. Moreover, at the age of eighteen or nineteen, he is 
neither a boy nor a man, yet sophisticated enough to de- 
mand the privileges of both. When he is asked to be care- 
ful in the mechanics of writing, he is surprised that such 
things are important to grown-ups; and when he is asked 
to do close, logical thinking, he is sure " the Department " 
has forgotten that he is not a candidate for the Ph.D. degree. 
His attitude toward college work would contribute more to 
his progress if he entered college at an earlier age. 

B. In Pedagogical Practice 

In pedagogical practice our most immediate need is not, 
I believe, in the school itself, but in the relation of the 
teacher to the community. If the force of the teacher's 
influence on the pupil is lost because of the language environ- 
ment in which the pupil lives when he is out of school, it 
seems scarcely necessary to urge that if we are to make more 



ORGANIZED LANGUAGE TRADITION 217 

than a snail's progress, we must work on the community at 
large as well as on the pupils in the school. We teachers 
of English must set ourselves to the ever-present but 
easily forgotten task of establishing a closer relation and a 
more thorough-going cooperation between the school and 
the home. 

We must become better missionaries. The spirit of 
enterprise and serviceableness, unfortunately for language 
tradition, has been left almost wholly to teachers of science, 
who, it must be said, have availed themselves of every 
opportunity to make the world feel how important they are 
to human welfare. Is it asking too much that teachers of 
English should display a little of this spirit ? Wherever 
there is a group of teachers of English in a community, or 
wherever there is one teacher, should there not be a social 
center of good literature, good writing, and good speech ? 
We must reach all classes, in so far as it is possible to do so, 
and make them feel that we are more than a mere luxury to 
the community. We must show parents how important it 
is that their sons and daughters should write good letters, 
good reports, and good applications for positions, and how 
essential that they should speak accurately and easily. In 
the smaller towns, newspapers might be prevailed upon to 
print instances of the importance of good English. If the 
moral in the tale did not hang too heavily, they might print 
the " stories " of how the skillful use of the mother tongue 
had helped boys and girls to secure positions that otherwise 
would have been given to some one else; or how the careless, 
awkward use of language had prevented even the best boy 
from " getting a hearing." One cannot talk many minutes 
with a college president, the manager of an employment 
bureau, or any merchant who possesses the least literary 
conscience, without learning of these instances. They 



218 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

may seem very commonplace to the teacher and they may 
seem to him an undignified means of developing respect for 
language, but to the parent who is struggling for a liveli- 
hood they are fresh and new, and they invariably make 
instruction in the mother tongue seem worth while. 1 

We should not, however, stop with efforts of this very 
simple kind. We must encourage parents to hear good 
speakers, and we must find more opportunities for bringing 
good books, good magazines, and good plays to their atten- 
tion. If we are conscientious and if we remain in one com- 
munity for a very long period, we can establish much the 
same kind of profitable relation between ourselves and the 
pupils' parents that usually exists between teachers and 
parents in France. If in every grade from the primary 
school to the university, teachers of English would spend a 
little time each week trying to develop a favorable attitude 
on the part of parents toward good speech and writing, 
instead of saying it is " no use," or that it " does not contrib- 
ute to scholarship," the effect would soon be noticeable. 
Many of the parents in our school and college communities 
would in a generation be cooperating heartily; and when 
parents and teachers cooperate, even the most obstinate 
pupils will yield. The stronghold of bad writing will 

1 Recently on a railway train I overheard an unsuccessful applicant for a 
responsible position as a construction engineer ask why he was not chosen. 
" Well," replied the chief engineer, " of the hundred and forty-seven appli- 
cants, you were one of the highest six. Any one of these would have satisfied 
our requirements if the other five had not applied; but we had to choose 

from the entire six, and we chose Mr. because of the excellence of his 

application." Here he opened a great bag of applications and drew one out. 
" Just look at that," he exclaimed. " Nobody could refuse that man's 
application. Look at the organization. Every point stands out so that you 
can't help seeing it. And see how straight his sentences are. That man 
goes right to the center of things. With his training and experience, and 
that sense of form, he can't fail to be a great engineer some day." 



ORGANIZED LANGUAGE TRADITION 219 

eventually capitulate — or at least be reduced to compara- 
tive feebleness - — if it is attacked on both sides. 

Within the classroom, if we are to gain any light from the 
French, our first great need is a more judicious distribution 
of exercises in writing. In many schools the work in com- 
position, regardless of its quality, is quite insufficient in 
amount. Such cases, of course, will not gain much by any 
change in method until the course itself is strengthened. 
It is not, however, about schools of this kind that I wish to 
speak, but rather those that, having enough composition, 
fail to distribute it well throughout the pupil's school career, 
or else fail to adapt it to his needs. From information 
gleaned within the past three years from several hundred 
American programmes of study as they are actually carried 
out, and from a more hasty examination of the general out- 
line followed in many other schools, I have found that very 
frequently, especially in the upper grades and in the high 
school, pupils are required to do much writing one year or 
one semester, and then during the succeeding year or 
semester do nothing at all, or, at most, write one long paper 
of some kind at the end of the term. Sometimes the lack of 
continuity is due to failure on the part of the superintendent 
or principal to provide time for continuous work ; sometimes 
it is due to a teacher's desire to lump the work in composi- 
tion together and have it out of the way once for all; and 
sometimes (heaven defend us!) it is due to a vote of the 
pupils to put theme-writing aside and take up something 
more interesting. But whatever the cause, the evil is 
serious, and should be remedied. The demands of variety 
may make it seem unwise to have the themes coming in at 
the same intervals year after year, regardless of the subject- 
matter upon which the pupil is asked to write; but he should 
never be permitted to lose whatever skill he has acquired. 



220 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

He must work steadily, habitually. Otherwise his own 
loose speech and writing, and the speech he hears every day, 
will surely gain the ascendancy. In no other kind of school 
work is there such great need of regular practice and steady, 
skillfully graduated progression. 

It is not my purpose here to attempt any detailed applica- 
tion of French classroom methods to the teaching of writing 
in American schools; the chapter on Composition ought to 
serve in itself as a sufficient explanation of what the indi- 
vidual American teacher might derive from the best practice 
in France. But one principle that dominates all the French 
teacher's work in composition deserves a larger place in our 
own classes; that is, the doing of the chief part of the work 
before the pupil writes, rather than after he has written. 
The principle, we remember, is applied both to the French 
boy's general preparation and to his preparation for a spe- 
cific composition. How much we need to emphasize it may 
be seen by reflecting upon the character of our pupils' 
typical deficiencies when they are ready to leave school or 
college. And the explanation is not difficult to find. When 
a boy is old enough to have some ideas of his own, we ask 
him to write, and we then find that he cannot handle the 
mechanical problems of his task. Now, as has been pointed 
out already, a boy can and must acquire skill before he can 
do serious consecutive thinking; and he might easily have a 
mastery of the mechanics of writing through such practice 
as may be found in well-graded dictation. 

In like preliminary manner he might acquire a much more 
serviceable vocabulary. Our pupils, as a class, are seriously 
restricted in their speech and writing because they have a 
relatively small stock of words at command; and they suffer 
further because they use words in a vague or a wholly incor- 
rect sense. Early in their life, while the world is still fresh 



ORGANIZED LANGUAGE TRADITION 221 

and full of wonder, they should be led to explore systemati- 
cally the neighborhood about them and to name the 
familiar objects that they behold every day. Then they 
should have similar guidance in expressing distinctions 
between less familiar physical and moral qualities, so that 
they can say what they really want to say. If the French 
could contribute nothing to the solution of our problems 
save their tried methods of teaching distinctions, they might 
well be regarded as great benefactors. They long ago found 
that the way to help a pupil to the power of seeing dif- 
ferences is not through the study of synonyms, but through 
the study of antonyms. The world stands out sharply in a 
boy's mind not when he sees likenesses, but when he sees 
contrasts. This, however, is not all that we might gain 
from the French in improving the pupil's vocabulary. We 
might in addition adopt the practice of requiring pupils to 
recall words quickly, so that their words will serve them in 
time of need. The object may be presented, and the word 
required, or a synonym or antonym may be used as the 
beginning. There are many legitimate kinds of association 
through which the word may be recalled. The matter of 
importance is that it be distinctly attached to the group of 
ideas to which it belongs. 

We may dwell long and affectionately upon the advan- 
tages of the unconscious assimilation of a working vocabu- 
lary; but when we see the mastery the French boy has 
gained by the time he has reached the age of eleven or 
twelve, we must admit that the effectiveness of systematic 
improvement is not open to question. 

Because of this belief in the efficacy of thorough prepara- 
tion, the French can instruct us, too, in finding and develop- 
ing material for compositions. Here again we suffer much 
because we rely so largely upon correction and criticism 



222 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

rather than prevision. The extent, in truth, to which we 
have developed the art of theme-correcting is marvelous. 
Our educational journals are full of schemes that are guaran- 
teed to save labor in marking corrections, of systems and 
symbols that will almost enable a teacher to hold a confer- 
ence with a pupil without seeing him; yet comparatively 
little is said about the best methods of interesting pupils in 
material and of encouraging them to meditate upon it, 
although these are the surest ways of saving labor and of 
making a delight of such criticism as must necessarily 
remain to be done. We are strangely illogical. If we do 
even the smallest piece of writing ourselves, we think upon 
the subject, read discussions of it, talk with our friends about 
it, and only after we have digested it thoroughly do we 
venture to write. Nevertheless, when we assign a theme, 
which, to begin with, is looked upon by the pupil as a mere 
task set by some one else, we frequently do not discuss the 
material in any thorough-going manner, and we do not 
always show the pupil how he might become interested in 
his subject by talking to his classmates and friends about it. 
We do not help him far in getting ideas, save in a very 
general way, and we hesitate to put a plan on the black- 
board, lest he copy it and use it. We give him only the 
slightest straw to clutch — sometimes only a title of four or 
five words — yet expect him to come out safely, and to find 
pleasure in the struggle. He probably does neither. His 
mind is unaccustomed to catching up stray ideas and putting 
them in order. He may not even do his best in trying to 
learn how. He writes what little is in his mind, or fits 
together some ideas that he has garbled from a book, and 
calls the result his " composition." Then we spend many 
precious minutes showing him, or trying to show him, how 
to tear his ideas all apart and rewrite them into a new theme. 



ORGANIZED LANGUAGE TRADITION 223 

Certainly there is little pedagogical or personal defense for 
our practice. If the teacher helps his pupils to enrich, 
quicken, and organize their material before they begin to 
write, he not only stimulates them to their best efforts, but 
saves himself infinite pains. 

Outside the classes in composition, our first step should be 
back toward grammar. We shall soon discover — possibly 
we are making the discovery now — that habit, though of 
the greatest importance in speech and writing, is not, 
unaided, a sufficient guide. To begin with, the pupils in 
many of our cities where the foreign population is large, and 
those in our smaller towns and country communities, hear 
so much incorrect English that if they rely on unconscious 
or subconscious memory, they are likely to be misguided. 
From habit they cannot speak normally, because they have 
no norm. They must, then, have recourse to usage as it is 
classified and recorded in a textbook. But there is a need 
for grammar beyond this. Even the best pupil must 
frequently examine and recast what he has written, and in 
doing this he must be able to handle the sentence skillfully. 
Now his early and continued practice in grammar, if it has 
been directed intelligently, has given him just the kind of 
knowledge and skill that revision demands. He can make 
the sentence do his bidding. 

Many of the trappings that accompanied the older teach- 
ing of grammar in this country are not necessary to adequate 
knowledge of the sentence. The work may be simplified, it 
may be vivified through a close relation to what the pupil 
reads and sees, and it may occupy a relatively small part of 
the school programme. But grammar, real grammar, it 
must be. And there is little reason why there should be any 
attempt to conceal it under a sugar-coating of " composi- 
tion " or " language exercises " or any other term less dis- 



224 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

tasteful than " grammar " itself. We can lose nothing if we 
call it by its real name, and then teach its wholesome 
principles from the first grade to the high school. More- 
over, in the last years of the high school we could increase 
the pupil's grasp of his native tongue by teaching him some 
of the elements of historical grammar. It is doubtful 
whether our pupils and higher students of English need 
anything quite so much as the steadying influence that 
grammar, well taught, can give. 

Again, we must teach the English classics, not present- 
day periodical literature. It seems exceedingly important 
that we should remember this just now, since much is being 
written concerning the value of courses in magazine reading. 
No teacher, I suppose, would deny the importance of having 
a pupil become acquainted with all the better contempo- 
rary periodicals. If he neglects them, he loses step with 
the world. But their appeal is so direct, they make such a 
pronounced conscious effort to interest him, and their 
material is so quickly understood, that he need not take 
courses in them. As a class, however legitimate their place 
in life may be, they are too light, too ephemeral, to require 
much explanation, much comment, much interpretation. 
They come easily, and they go easily. On the other hand, 
the great piece of literature, the one that is capable of mak- 
ing an infinite number of appeals to the same reader, must 
be looked at, turned over, reflected upon. Here the pupil 
needs encouragement and aid. He must be led to see that 
the classic, when he rightly appreciates it, is something 
that he likes. To come into this state of mind may be 
difficult for him, but once he does, he has gained a possession 
that will color and brighten his existence as long as he lives. 
He may become a reader of the magazines, as well as cur- 
rent books of fiction, almost any time in his life; but if he is 



ORGANIZED LANGUAGE TRADITION 225 

to be a reader of the best literature in the language, he must 
begin early and have guidance. 

Moreover, we must have a less artificial relation between 
composition and literature. We do not need any intricate 
or magical balancing of reading and style, but only a larger 
application of common sense. Pupils of high-school age, or 
younger, can grasp well-expressed ideas much more readily 
than they can detect and express a writer's sense of form. 
Moreover, since the feeling for form that a writer carries 
into his work is often much more individual and personal 
than his ideas, different pupils are much less likely to appre- 
ciate it in an equal degree. Then, too, the same pupil's 
feeling for a given writer's sense of form varies greatly from 
time to time. It seems better, therefore, to base compara- 
tively few compositions on criticism. Most of the time, 
young boys and girls who have compositions to write 
would rather discuss some good, wholesome idea expressed 
by an author than prepare any disquisition on his literary 
theory; and their youthful minds are in this respect fairly 
safe guides. The teacher can, then, help both composition 
and literature by asking pupils to write on what they really 
think when they come face to face with what an author says. 
Frequently they will be surprised to find that great authors 
say anything that one would care to know; so long have 
they taken it for granted that classics were written for the 
sole purpose of being dismembered. In their eagerness they 
will develop a desire to read; and when they read for the 
purpose of knowing just what an author says, they are tak- 
ing the first long step toward genuine appreciation and a 
working knowledge of literary form. 

We shall not, however, come to the fullest influence of 
literature on writing unless we place greater emphasis upon 
the cultivation of the memory. There can be little doubt 



226 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

that the French are justified in their belief that the best part 
of the effect of what the pupil reads is not through any over- 
nice interweaving of lessons in literature and composition, 
but in the general effect of filling the memory with the ideas, 
the phrasing, the coloring, and the movement of the writ- 
ings of a number of authors. We are missing this influence 
almost wholly because our pupils have no great fund of 
good literature that they remember distinctly, either word 
for word, or in essential idea. And what is more deplor- 
able, at the end of their school and college careers they do 
not seem to have memories that are at all reliable in retain- 
ing anything. We have talked much about the spirit of 
education, and in our heroic efforts to catch the spirit 
without first having the substance, we have come to look 
upon the exercise of memory as a very old-fashioned practice 
that ought to be discarded because it sometimes requires 
more rigorous mental effort than pupils are willing to make. 
As a result of this attitude, our boys and girls remember few 
things, and these very imperfectly. If a boy says that Job 
was a character in the Bible, or that Milton was an English 
writer who lived before the Revolutionary War, he seems to 
think that he has been sufficiently definite and that further 
details would be " mechanically " exacting. And how 
many of our school pupils or college students can recite 
even three good poems from memory ? They do not know 
a great religious hymn, or a song from a good opera, and 
they cannot sing America or The Star Spangled Banner unless 
they have the words before their eyes. In so far as their 
memories are active at all, they are taken up with the cheap- 
est songs of the hour (perhaps the chorus of each), most of 
which are below mediocrity in music and are either char- 
acterless or vicious in sentiment and expression. 



ORGANIZED LANGUAGE TRADITION 227 

Now I am aware that memory work might be overdone; 
but there is little danger of such a misfortune in America at 
the present time. We have gone to the extreme in the other 
direction. To go back at least a part of the way is our 
serious duty. If our pupils are to have any feeling for order, 
for movement, for all that is included in the word style, we 
must give them some permanent antidote for the poisonous 
literary refreshment they find for themselves, and we must 
help them to acquire a fund of good literature that will be a 
positive enrichment to their lives. It is quite useless to ask 
boys and girls to express themselves in English suitable to a 
given occasion when they have no clear conception of occa- 
sions. If they are to write well, their minds must pass 
through a long period of preparation. They must have 
practice, for they must gain immediate skill, and their entire 
intellectual life must be quickened to receive the results of 
reading. But they must remember what they read. We 
cannot control every pupil's environment so that he will 
hear only good speech; but we can so fill his memory with 
good literature that it will never cease to echo and re-echo 
through his consciousness. 

These, it may be said, are very matter-of-fact suggestions. 
They are. I have already explained that French teachers 
are not much given to chasing novel or whimsical methods. 
And a study of their schools will convince almost any Ameri- 
can that one of our greatest educational needs is larger 
faithfulness to a few well-proved practices. We have a 
national habit of taking up a subject or idea, proving its 
absolute importance, and then immediately forgetting all 
about it. Ten years ago, for example, everybody dis- 
cussed correlation of studies. Every assembly of teachers, 
from the state association to the township monthly institute 
or village fortnightly meeting, resounded with discussions of 



228 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

correlation. To-day correlation is just as important as it 
was ten years ago — and in most respects it is quite as far 
from being realized — yet comparatively little is said upon 
the subject. It has given way in turn to vocational guidance, 
Montessori education, and sex hygiene. In the field of Eng- 
lish, the same unrest has been evident. Oral composition, 
commercial correspondence, dramatization, learning to 
write by learning to think, have in turn received large at- 
tention. As if all of them were not of great and undiminish- 
ing importance! Truly, our *task is not to discover the 
wholly new and untried, but to be patient in carrying 
reasonable and accepted methods into practice. 

We must, too, be insistent in our demands for work of 
good quality. I would not minimize the importance of 
quality in other subjects, but in the study of the mother 
tongue it is peculiarly essential. The native language differs 
from other subjects in that the pupil always has a fund of 
knowledge about it that he has acquired more or less uncon- 
sciously. He must, then, be brought into an alert, open 
state of mind before he has any real consciousness of the 
language or can have a very definite feeling for its correct or 
effective use. The French boy, it is well known, has more 
to do in school than the American boy has, and his work is 
more exacting in character. As a result, he is kept in a 
state of activity that holds his mind open to impression. 
Now by compressing our course of study, as I have already 
pointed out, and by insistence upon work of high quality, 
we shall do much to bring our pupils into a similar state. A 
boy may go along very pleasantly from year to year and 
avoid making egregious blunders in either speech or writing; 
yet because he is not thoroughly awakened, he may never 
quite gain a real working mastery over his mother tongue. 
Whether he likes the experience or not, he must be brought 



ORGANIZED LANGUAGE TRADITION 229 

up to white heat in his mental activities so that he may 
become impressionable to things that are subtle or evasive 
in character, and conscious to some extent of his everyday 
mental life. His mind must have some genuine discipline, j 

C. In Finding and Preparing Teachers 

Nothing, however, in the nature of readjustment or 
reemphasis in our school organization or classroom method 
will result in the highest possible good unless we have a 
greater number of efficient teachers. It is remarkable 
and regrettable that the teacher, the center and life of 
the school, has received so little of our thought. I do not 
speak disparagingly of our normal schools, for they are doing 
a valuable service in spite of the criticism that has been 
heaped upon them; I refer rather to the passive attitude of 
school officers and teachers themselves. Go to our educa- 
tional meetings, read the proceedings of our national and 
state associations, or glance through our leading educational 
journals, and how much is found about the questions of dis- 
covering and preparing good teachers ? All other subjects 

— deficients, fine art, agriculture, high school fraternities, 

— are treated with spirit and completeness; but the one 
topic that is more important than any other is well-nigh 
forgotten. And when one visits our schools and colleges, 
one can see that this attitude is carried into practice. We 
have the spectacle of quarter-million-dollar high school 
buildings " manned " in the main by eight-hundred-dollar 
teachers; we have universities with ten-million-dollar 
" plants " operated to a surprising extent by young assist- 
ants and instructors who receive but little more than the 
teachers in the high school. Our interest in the machinery, 
the trappings of education — the part that can be pointed 
out easily and impressively to patrons of learning — has 



230 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

been so great that we have in large measure lost sight of the 
teacher. 

From this condition, English has probably been the 
greatest sufferer. To begin with, the more " practical " 
subjects demand and receive first attention; their signifi- 
cance is immediately recognized. Secondly, it seems to be 
taken for granted in many school communities that since 
everybody speaks the English language, anybody ought to 
be able to teach it. Superintendents and principals fre- 
quently will go to a college, university, or normal school, 
choose a man who will be a good football or basketball coach, 
and without making any inquiry whatever concerning his 
record in English, will put him in charge of classes in com- 
position and literature. Too often it happens that he is 
disgracefully poor in English, and through his weakness 
neutralizes all the good effect of the other English teachers 
in the school. Of course, in our present mania for highly 
organized athletics, all departments in our schools suffer in 
this manner; but the supposed ease with which anyone may 
be made into a teacher of the mother tongue causes English 
to suffer out of proportion. 

We must, then, be more zealous in finding young men and 
women who will develop into good teachers. In some defi- 
nite manner we must help the indifferent superintendent to 
see that he ought not to foist an inadequately trained college 
graduate upon the high-school department of English, and 
we must make him feel that he should not rely upon chance 
in getting new teachers when vacancies occur. Why 
should he not have at all times a list of good candidates 
from which he might make selection? And then everyone 
who teaches English must devote more thought to means of 
encouraging promising boys and girls to go into the English 
field. When a pupil reveals unusual ability in the mother 



ORGANIZED LANGUAGE TRADITION 231 

tongue, we should not sit idly by while he decides to take up 
the teaching of German or botany or mathematics. We 
must be active in finding promising recruits, so that school 
officers may not justly complain of a dearth of material. 

Once promising candidates are found, they must have 
sufficient academic and professional training. This declara- 
tion, I am aware, may seem quite unnecessary. Yet if we 
bear in mind the professional qualifications of a large per 
cent of our rural, village, or even city teachers, we can see 
that we are far removed from an ideal condition. As was 
pointed out in the preceding chapter, many of our teachers 
are as well trained as the best that are to be found anywhere ; 
but there are so many with wholly inadequate preparation 
that they make the average very low. 1 

Aside from the perfectly obvious fact that more thorough 
preparation would contribute to sounder scholarship gen- 
erally, there are specific reasons why the English teacher 
should be well trained. First, the mother tongue is prob- 
ably influenced more than any other subject by the general 
tone of the teaching force. Anyone who enters a school- 
room with narrow or meagre preparation is almost certain to 
reveal his weakness in his speech and writing. On the other 
hand, the teacher of the mother tongue profits peculiarly by 
a period of training in a normal school, college, or university, 
since he is not merely receiving systematic instruction, but, 
through daily contact with other minds in the educated 
community, is having his instruction driven home. In 
this double process he not only learns better what to present 
in the classroom, but remedies weaknesses in his own 
speech that would be dangerous to the language conscience 
of his pupils. Secondly, because of the inclusiveness of the 
field of English and the interrelation of the different parts 

1 See the comparison with the French teacher in Chapter VII. 



232 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

of the field, the subject gains almost immeasurably through 
being presented by one who has a deep background of 
knowledge. A teacher may be a slave to a textbook and 
still be of some service to his pupils, but if he is really to 
illumine his subject, he must have breadth of knowledge 
of his own. 

Especially in the training of elementary teachers should 
our efforts be in the direction of greater thoroughness. The 
per cent of American teachers of the lower grades who have 
had no training beyond the high school is distressingly large; 
and the number of those who have completed only the 
common-school course is much larger than is generally 
supposed. Some have attended a normal school for the 
short summer term, but many have not had even this 
opportunity for professional improvement. Now, if we but 
reflect upon the scope of the field of English and the daily 
questions that require more than elementary knowledge on 
the part of the teacher, we cannot fail to see the necessity of 
more thorough training. Why should a man or woman 
who teaches ten-year-old boys be less thoroughly prepared 
than the one who instructs high-school pupils ? In truth, the 
problems of the former sometimes require the wider knowl- 
edge. But however that may be, the elementary teachers 
should have a large fund of knowledge beyond the immediate 
routine demands of the class. The limits fixed by the 
course of study should be conveniences, not barriers beyond 
which the class should never venture. If, however, the 
pupils are to catch glimpses of a world larger than the text- 
book or classroom, the teacher must be able to help them. 
He should have a wide acquaintance with literature, the 
ability to write with some degree of skill, and, above all else, 
enough systematic knowledge of his subject to enable him 
to know his own weaknesses, to judge between arbitrary 



ORGANIZED LANGUAGE TRADITION 233 

rule and established principle, to know when to accept the 
new and when to hold fast to the old. He must have 
enough knowledge, and he must have it well enough or- 
ganized, to enable him to exercise the power of selection, 
whether in choosing material for his pupils to read, or in 
discussing a poem, or in criticising a dictation or composition. 
Training, to be sure, will not make a teacher effective if he 
has poor native ability; but given teaching intelligence, 
training of this broad character will enable one to pass from 
the rank of the ordinary teacher to that of the teacher whose 
work is immediately recognized because of its depth and 
permanence. 

There is nothing ultra-idealistic in the nature of the con- 
viction that better training is within the range of possibil- 
ity. Men whose chief concern in life is business or politics 
will help to bring about the change if they are only made to 
see the necessity of it. And the higher standards would 
soon cease to excite comment; they would be taken for 
granted. Their necessity would be accepted just as we have 
accepted the necessity of automobiles, interurban cars, and 
wireless telegraphy. A few years ago when one state passed 
a law which made the minimum requirement for any kind of 
teacher a four-year course in a recognized high school, plus 
at least twelve weeks of professional training in a normal 
school or department of education in a college or univer- 
sity, it was said freely that schools would soon be without 
teachers. Yet at the present time the wisdom of the change 
is scarcely questioned by anyone, and candidates for the 
profession prepare to meet the requirement very much as if 
it had always existed. All that is necessary in bringing 
about such desirable changes is a little concentrated effort. 

Any consideration of training for advanced teaching 
brings us face to face immediately with the whole problem 



234 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

of graduate study in our universities. For several years it 
has been customary, whenever discussion has arisen concern- 
ing advanced training in English, to criticise our graduate 
schools roundly, denounce the study of " philology", and 
close by proclaiming the case hopeless. Some of this 
criticism has been wholly without justification, much of it 
has been well-founded, and most of it has been offered in a 
spirit that has contributed nothing toward an unprejudiced 
study of the question. It is true beyond denial that much 
of the graduate work in English in American universities 
during the past ten or twenty years, especially that leading 
directly to the Ph.D. degree, has not helped greatly to 
spread the gospel of good writing. Much of the study bears 
only a remote relation to the work of the high schools, 
normal schools, and colleges, it is not always liberalizing 
in the sense that corresponding study in history, economics, 
or philosophy is liberalizing, and the student who carries his 
work as far as the Ph.D. degree is in serious danger of being 
wholly unfitted in attitude for taking up the kind of work 
that he is almost certain to be called upon to do as soon as 
he is ready to teach. When he leaves the university he is 
likely to express hearty contempt for undergraduates, to 
scoff at pedagogical principle as so much useless flummery, 
to regard the offering of graduate courses and the carrying 
on of research as the only real heaven in which it is pos- 
sible to " make a contribution," and, partly as a result of 
this last conviction, to confuse fruitful scholarly investiga- 
tion with the least interesting devices of the investigator's 
method. 

On the other hand, the close specialization that has 
characterized the work required for the Ph.D. degree has had 
one pronounced and usually forgotten beneficial effect: it 
has emphasized the necessity of greater accuracy in the 



ORGANIZED LANGUAGE TRADITION 235 

teaching of the mother tongue. This, in our new country, 
is a service that ought not to be unappreciated. It is 
frequently said with some justification that too many of our 
English scholars have lost sight of the beauty and richness 
of their subject and have become narrow-minded mediaeval 
source-hunters. Yet when one bears in mind the flimsy, 
unsubstantial " appreciation " that stands at the other 
extreme, one is constrained to say that if we must choose 
between the two, we had better take the source-hunting. 
It has at least the virtue of requiring accuracy, and if a man 
pursues it, he will in any event develop solidity of fibre. 
While the case, then, against the universities has been a real 
one, it has not been wholly one-sided; and it is not one that 
will be settled by bitter denunciation or purely negative 
criticism. 

The most urgent need in university study of English 
to-day is a graduate course covering three or even four 
years that does not demand research primarily, or even 
largely. As our work is now carried on, a graduate student 
must stop with the A.M. degree, after one or two years of 
study, or he must give himself over to specialization in his 
field and to research leading to the Ph.D. If he chooses to 
spend one or two years in the graduate school after he 
receives his A.M., but does not choose to become a candi- 
date for the Ph.D., he suffers the humiliation either of being 
looked upon as one who has fallen short, or of being re- 
garded as having no definite purpose. We ought to have a 
university course of study in the mother tongue that would 
correspond in certain respects to the work carried on in 
preparation for the aggregation in France. It would repre- 
sent a deep foundation in the study of languages and a broad 
but accurate knowledge of the literature of the mother 
tongue. The candidate would devote himself to regular 



236 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

advanced courses in his native language and literature, to 
wide reading, and to some intensive study. But he would 
not focus his chief effort upon a special field in which he is 
supposed to become competent " to advance knowledge." 
When he has finished his course he would submit himself to 
an examination covering thoroughly his entire field of study. 
As a fitting degree for this course, the Litt.D. might be 
transferred from the field of honorary degrees. The Ph.D. 
could then be kept as a mark of distinction for men who have 
special ability in research. 

This readjustment in graduate study would help much in 
giving to English teaching the balance and unity of spirit 
which it deeply needs. To-day the student in the univer- 
sity, the college, or even the high school, is tugged back and 
forth by different teachers until the field of English seems to 
him a mystic maze. One teacher thinks the only work 
deserving the name is based upon scientific language study; 
his successor the next year, or perhaps one of his colleagues 
at the very time, believes only in aesthetic interpretation; 
another sees value only in the study of poetry; the next 
thinks it sacrilege to attempt to teach poetry; and possibly 
the next is some lost meteoric soul in the educational heavens 
who doubts whether language, literature, or anything else 
can really be taught at all. Is it surprising when candidates 
for the profession of teaching have been submitted to treat- 
ment of this sort that our departments of English are so 
wholly lacking in unity of spirit ? Cooperation is quite 
impossible, because the different members are going in 
different directions — or at least they think they are. 
Now, if teachers were trained to look out upon their field of 
knowledge without being permitted to imagine that all of it 
centered about one very small and possibly obscure corner, 
this heterogeneous character of our departments of English 



ORGANIZED LANGUAGE TRADITION 237 

would sooner or later become less pronounced. Lovers of 
nineteenth century poetry would cease to scoff at the col- 
league who found interest in Old or Middle English; and it 
is scarcely too much to believe that many another teacher 
might cease to look upon all courses in composition or 
modern literature as only so much penance that must be 
done before one may be admitted to " the glorified life of 
giving graduate courses." 

D. In the Teacher's Position 

As soon as there is a more distinct general movement 
toward the better preparation of teachers of English, the 
time will be doubly ripe for demanding better working con- 
ditions and better salaries. As a matter of simple reasoning, 
what kind of result may be expected when a man or 
woman is obliged to go from school to school every four or 
five years searching for a new position, is required to teach 
from twenty-five to thirty-two hours a week in addition to 
committee work and the important labor of reading manu- 
script, and for the sacrifice is paid eight hundred, six 
hundred, or five hundred dollars a year, with the certain 
prospect of being dropped from the pay-roll at a relatively 
early age ? These are the present conditions in schools 
outside the largest centers of population. In the higher 
institutions, conditions are usually better, 1 although in many 
colleges that have small financial support, and in many of 
the universities that are having the most rapid growth, the 

1 See the various editions of the Hopkins Report on The Cost and Labor of 
English Teaching. If there is a teacher of English in America who has not 
seen this report, he should procure a copy at once and study it. It was 
originally published by the University of Kansas, but has been reprinted 
many times elsewhere. A copy may be had by sending five cents to the 
Department of Journalism Press, University of Kansas, 



238 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

" English situation " is still quite " impossible." The 
necessity of reform is so general and so urgent that it 
scarcely requires discussion. 

The teacher of English must receive a larger salary. 
" Easy enough to say," some one usually exclaims when 
such a declaration is made, " but where is the money to 
come from ? " Now in all institutions supported by public 
tax, is it not just as much a part of the teacher's legitimate 
business to find this out, as it is to improve the public wel- 
fare through purely professional skill ? The chief difficulty 
in the past has been, I believe, that teachers, because of 
their short tenure of service in a community or their short 
careers in the profession, have given very little thought 
toward improving the conditions under which they are asked 
to work. How many who read this paragraph know what 
the tax levy for educational purposes was in their city or 
county or township last year ? How much was it for the 
support of political officeholders ? Why does it always 
seem difficult to secure money that is to be paid to teachers 
in salaries, but easy to secure it for new buildings ? How 
many have talked with their county or city officials about 
the importance of quality in school work, and the relation of 
quality to the salaries paid to teachers. How many know 
how their salaries compare with the wages of skilled and 
unskilled laborers in the community ? 1 Or how many know 
how their salaries compare with the salaries received by 

1 The Baltimore and Ohio, New York Central, Pennsylvania, Lackawanna, 
and Big Four Railroad Companies reported the following average wages of 
employees in 1913: 

Passenger Passenger Freight Freight 

Conductor Brakeman Conductor Brakeman 

Baltimore and Ohio $1574- $096.75 $1219.15 $834.95 

New York Central 1626.79 1017.18 1322.60 877.95 

Pennsylvania 1636. 961.75 1326.55 901.72 

Lackawanna 1636.69 954-41 1296.78 864.94 

Big Four 1767-74 1027.57 1313-5° 859.80 



ORGANIZED LANGUAGE TRADITION 239 

teachers in other departments of the same school ? l No 
plea for the righteousness of paying respectable salaries will 
have any weight until the teachers support their cause with 
definite knowledge. When men and women make clear to 
school officials that they are teaching an all-important sub- 
ject, that they want to teach it as well as it can be taught, 
that they are working overtime and receiving half pay, and 
that they know the money for making the necessary changes 
is to be had, a new order will be brought into existence. 
Incidentally, everyone will hold the English teacher in 
greater respect; and he will have infinitely greater respect 
for himself. 

IV. THE FUNDAMENTAL CHARACTER OF OUR NEEDS 

To be sure, the changes I have suggested in this chapter 
are not the only ones that might grow logically from a study 
of what the French are doing. A great many others, either 
remote in their bearing or minor in their importance, might 
well claim attention. Some one may wonder why I have 
not said more about the possible influence of separate educa- 
tion on pupils' work; some one else may be disappointed 
because I have not traced the influence of French home disci- 
pline as it is revealed in the written work of pupils; and 
still others may regret that I have not spoken at greater 
length concerning the devices of individual teachers. These 
matters have their significance. But our chief needs are 
immediate in their bearing, and they are fundamental in 
character. In so far as the mother tongue is concerned, the 

1 In some high schools, the teacher of manual training, I have found, 
receives almost twice as large a salary as the teacher of English. In one 
large school that occupies a building which cost $225,000, the manual train- 
ing teacher two years ago received $1600, the head of the department of 
English, $810. 



240 HOW THE FRENCH BOY LEARNS TO WRITE 

essential difference between our procedure and that of the 
French is that the French have viewed their problem in the 
large and have then determined at the outset the chief 
things essential to its solution, while we have given our 
attention to small matters that are of consequence only after 
general lines of procedure — which we have not adopted — 
have been agreed upon. We have, too frequently, taxed 
our ingenuity to the utmost to develop methods of doing 
work that, in most instances, should not be done at all. 
We must approach from the other side. Devices that have 
to do with small matters will avail little so long as they must 
be used as a system of correctives in an educational scheme 
that is faulty in larger, more fundamental ways. When we 
can have readjustments in school organization that will 
make the effective teaching of English possible; when we 
have taken up our work in the community with greater zeal; 
when we have learned better how to guide pupils in pre- 
paring to write, so that writing will not seem unnatural and 
unrelated to other activities; when we have reestablished 
ourselves on a sound basis of grammar and have turned to 
the early reading and memorizing of good literature; when 
teachers are more thoroughly trained, and when teachers 
and school officials alike are content to pursue methods that 
are sound, whether or not they are easy or novel; — when 
we have carefully readjusted ourselves in these respects, we 
may hope to make more rapid progress in helping our boys 
and girls to write well. We can scarcely hope for it before. 



APPENDIX 



APPENDIX 

(4) BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Inasmuch as the preceding pages are so very largely the 
result of first-hand observation, I make no pretense of offering a 
comprehensive bibliography. If, however, anyone wishes to 
carry out an investigation of his own, he will find the following 
books and articles valuable in making preparation. 

PRINTED IN FRENCH 

Annates du Baccalaureat. Librairie Vuibert. 

Instructions concernant les programmes de V ' Enseignement second- 
are. 274 pages (in 1912). These directions and suggestions 
are, of course, revised from time to time. Librairie Charles 
Delagrave. 

Plan d' etudes et programmes de V Enseignement secondaire: des 
Garqons; des Filles. Librairie Vuibert. 

Plan d' etudes et programmes d 'enseignement des Ecoles primaires. 

(a) JEcoles maternelles. 

(b) Ecoles primaires elementaires. 

(c) Hcoles primaires superieures. 

(d) Ecoles normales dHnstituteurs. 

(e) Ecoles normales d'institutrices. 
Librairie Delalain Freres. 



Bezard: La classe de francais. Journal d'un Professeur dans 
une division de Seconde C (Latin-Sciences). 320 pages. 
Librairie Vuibert. 

De la Methode litteraire. Journal d'un Professeur dans 
une classe de Premiere. 738 pages. Librairie Vuibert. 
Comment apprendre le latin a nos fits. 424 pages. Li- 
brairie Vuibert. 



244 APPENDIX 

E. Bouchendhomme: De V Enseignement du franqais. 211 
pages. Librairie Armand Colin. 

Brucker et Caustier: U Enseignement des leqons de choses. 189 
pages. Conferences du Musee pedagogique, 191 2. Im- 
primerie Nationale. 

F. Brunot: L Enseignement de la Langue franqaise. 192 pages. 
Librairie Armand Colin. 

Cellerier et Dugas: VAnnee pedagogique. Librairie Felix 
Alcan. An annual review of education and educational 
articles. 

E. Delalain: Annuaire de V Instruction publique. Librairie 
Delalain Freres. A classified directory of all the officers of 
instruction and teachers in the universities, normal schools, 
special schools, and secondary schools of France. It includes 
also the officers of instruction, but not the teachers, of the 
upper primary schools. A glance through the volume gives 
one a good notion of the system in French education. 

A. Gazier: Traited' explication franqaise. 218 pages. Librairie 
Belin Freres. 

G. Lanson, G. Rudler, A. Cahen, et J. Bezard: V Enseignement 
du franqais. 197 pages. Conferences du Musee Pedago- 
gique, 1909. Imprimerie Nationale. This book is a report 
of one of the round-table meetings held from time to time at 
the Musee Pedagogique in Paris. 

M. Michel: Notions elementaires de Grammaire kistorique. 146 

pages. Librairie Belin Freres. 
Mutelet et Dangueuger: Programmes officiels des Ecoles pri- 

maires elementaires: interpretation, divisions, emplois du 

temps. 268 pages. Librairie Hachette et Cie. 
L. Poitrinal: Comment enseigner le franqais a VEcole primaire. 

142 pages. Librairie Charles Delagrave. 
Ribot Commission (The) : Enquete sur V enseignement secondaire. 

Imprimerie Nationale. See the testimony that deals with 

the teaching of languages. 
G. Rudler: L' Explication franqaise. 249 pages. Librairie 

Armand Colin. 



APPENDIX 245 

H. Vuibert: Annuaire dela Jeunesse. Librairie Vuibert. This 
annual volume is indispensable to one who wishes to be in- 
formed on French education from year to year. The issue 
for 1913 contains 1196 pages of sound information. 

A. Wissemans: Nouveau Code de V Instruction primaire. 924 
pages (in 1912). Librairie Hachette et Cie. This volume, 
known as the Code Pichard, is a classified arrangement of all 
national laws that touch the primary school system. 
Code de V Enseignement secondaire. 419 pages (in 1910). 
Librairie Hachette et Cie. 

PRINTED IN ENGLISH 

English Board of Education: Special Reports on Educational 
Subjects. Vol. 24. 554 pages. This volume is devoted to 
secondary and university education in France. It contains 
much information about French secondary schools, including 
a substantial article on The Teaching of the Mother Tongue, 
by Arthur H. Hope. Some of the material for the report 
(not, however, for any part of Mr. Hope's article) was 
secured as early as 1898 and 1900, so that it is now a little 
out of date. The volume is, however, valuable as a means of 
comparing English and French education. Wyman and Sons, 
London. 1911. 

Frederic Ernest Farrington: The Public Primary School System 
of France. 303 pages. Published by Columbia University. 
1906. 

French Secondary Schools. 450 pages. Longmans, Green, 
and Company. 1910. 

These two books give excellent accounts of the develop- 
ment and present organization of the French primary and 
secondary school systems. 

P. J. Hartog: The Writing of English. 164 pages. This small 
book includes an account of some visits that the author made 
to French classes in the mother tongue several years ago. 
The Clarendon Press, Oxford. 1907. 

Karl Young: Composition Teaching in French Lycees. English 
Journal, June, 191 2. 



246 APPENDIX 

(B) THE MOTHER TONGUE IN THE PRIMARY 
NORMAL SCHOOL 1 

First year five hours a week 

Second year four hours a week 

Third year four hours a week 

I. READING AND RECITATION 

(Three hours a week in the first and second years [two hours a week in the 
third year].) 

The reading aloud of classical works. The explication of the 
chief pieces; the memorization of the most important passages. 

Personal readings indicated by the instructor or chosen under 
his direction by the student. 

II. GRAMMAR AND GRAMMATICAL EXERCISES 

(One hour a week in the first year [and the third year].) 

Analytical study of grammar, illuminated by some essential 
notions of historical grammar. 

Exercises, chiefly oral, in orthography and vocabulary, and 
in grammatical and logical analysis. 

in. EXERCISES IN COMPOSITION 

(One hour a week each year.) 

Programme 

First Year 

Readings to form the literary taste of the students and to 
interest them in problems of conduct. For example: 
Corneille: Le Cid. — Horace. — Cinna. — Polyeucte. 
Racine: Andromaque. — Britannicus. — Athalie. 
Moliere: VAvare. — Le Bourgeois gentilhomme. 
La Fontaine: Several fables. 

1 Translated from the programmes of study. 



APPENDIX 247 

Boileau: Selections from the Satires and I'Art poetique. 

Bossuet: Oraison funebre d'Henriette d'Angleterre. — Sermon sur 
la mort. — Meditation sur la bribvete de la vie. 

Pascal: Several thoughts. Les deux infinis. 

La Bruyere: Portraits and meditations (Chapters de l' Homme 
and des Jugements, du Merite personnel, selections). 

M me de Sevigne: Selected letters. 

Lamartine: Milly. — La Mort de Socrate. 

Victor Hugo: Ce qu'on entend sur la montagne. — Ceux qui 
vivent ce sont ceux qui luttent. — Ultima verba. — Le mariage 
de Roland. — Les Pauvres Gens. 

Selected Moralistes of the seventeenth, eighteenth, and nine- 
teenth centuries. 

Nisard, Sainte-Beuve: Some pages of criticism on Bossuet, 
Boileau, Racine, and Moliere. 

Second Year 
(This list is given, as the preceding, by way of suggestion.) 

1. Middle Ages: 
Chanson de Roland. 
Selections from Mysteres. 
L'avocat Pathelin. 

The chronicle writers and especially Joinville. 
Villon: Ballade des pendus. 

2. Renaissance: 

(a) Prose writers. 
Rabelais: Selections. 
Amyot: Selections. 

Montaigne: Lettre sur la mort de la Bo'etie, — Selections 
on friendship. 

(b) Poets. 

Some poems by Marot, Ronsard, and du Bellay. 

3. The seventeenth century: 
La Rochefoucauld: Maximes. 
La Bruyere: The Caracteres. 
La Fontaine: Several fables. 



248 APPENDIX 

Moliere: Le Misanthrope. 

Boileau: Art poetique, Canto IV (le Poete honnete homme). 

Selected letters of the century. 

4. The eighteenth century: 

Montesquieu: Considerations: The comparison of Rome and 
Carthage (Compare with Bossuet). — Esprit des lois: 
Chapter XXV, § 5 and 13. Chapter XIX, § 5. 

Voltaire: Selected letters. — Steele de Louis XIV (Chapter 
XXXII). Selections from his stories and from his Dic- 
tionnaire philosophique. 

Rousseau: Lettre a Voltaire sur le desastre de Lisbonne. — 
Lettre a d'Alembert sur les spectacles (selections). Emile: 
Books I, II (selections). — Reveries du Promeneur solitaire 
(selections). 

Diderot: Selections. 

5. Revolution and nineteenth century: 

Discourses or parts of discourses by Mirabeau, Vergniaud, 

Danton, Benjamin Constant, Royer-Collard, Lamartine, 

Thiers, Gambetta, J. Ferry. 
Chateaubriand: Extracts from Martyrs, from Vltineraire de 

Paris a Jerusalem, and from Memoires d'Outre-Tombe. 
A. Thierry: Recits Merovingiens (the 4th). — Dix ans 

d' Etudes historique (selections). 
Guizot: Essais sur VHistoire de France (The fifth: Essai sur 

la Feodalite). 
Michelet: Histoire de France (fifteenth century) and extracts 

from Volume I of the Histoire de la Revolution. 
Lamartine: Jocelyn: ninth epoque {Les Laboureurs). 
Hugo : O souvenirs, printemps, aurore. — A Villequier. — 

L 'expiation. — Lux. 
Musset: La Nuit de Mai. 
Vigny: La Mort du Loup. — La Bouteille a la Mer. 

Third Year 

Explication of texts two hours a week 

Composition one hour a week 

Grammar '. one hour a week 



APPENDIX 



Explication of Texts 



249 



First part. — Readings and comments designed to illuminate the 

following subjects: 
Classic tragedy and romantic drama. 
Comedy since Moliere: Marivaux, Beaumarchais, E. Augier. 
The transformation of history in the nineteenth century: 

from Augustin Thierry to Fustel de Coulanges. 
The novel in the nineteenth century: Hugo, Sand, Balzac, 

Flaubert, Zola, Daudet. 
The principal masters of literary criticism in the nineteenth 

century: Nisard, Sainte-Beuve, Taine. 
The great modern poets: Chenier, Lamartine, Hugo, Musset, 

Vigny, Leconte de Lisle, Sully-Prudhomme. 

Second part. — Reading of the masterpieces of ancient literature 
and of modern foreign literature. 

The Iliad (Books VI, XXII, XXIII, XXIV). 

The Odyssey (Books VI, XI, XXIII). 

^Eschylus: The Persians. 

Sophocles: (Edipus Rex. — Philoctetes. 

Euripides: Iphigenia at Aulis. — Alcestis. 

Aristophanes: The Wasps (selections). 

Demosthenes: Philippics (the first). 

Plutarch: Two of the Lives (in comparison). 

Plato: Apology. — The end of Phaedo. — Crito. 

Lucretius: On the Nature of Things. 

Vergil: Georgics (episodes). — The JEneid (Books VI and IX). 

Caesar: The War against the Gauls. Book VI. The cus- 
toms of the Gauls. 

Tacitus: Annals: Book VI. Death of Tiberius. — Book 
XVI. Nero on the theatre. 

Shakespeare: Macbeth. — Richard III. — Hamlet. 

Goethe: Iphigenie. 

Schiller: William Tell. 



2 so APPENDIX 

Dante: The Divine Comedy: Inferno (Cantos I, II, III, VII, 
XXXD7, XXXVI). 

Cervantes: Don Quixote (selections). 

Third part. — Selection of readings for the popular lectures. 1 

Pedagogical Directions 

The instructions which have been given relative to the teach- 
ing of French in the first and second years apply for the most part 
to the exercises of the third year. It is necessary, however, that 
the personal work of the students increase steadily and that the 
part of the instructor be diminished and modified. For this 
reason, only two classes a week in reading are maintained in the 
third year, — classes that sometimes require of the student four 
or five hours of preparation [for each]. The instructor ought 
less and less to explain or even to question. It is the student who 
ought to speak in a continuous manner, so that the instructor 
may form an opinion of his knowledge, his method, and the 
sureness of his judgment, and give him efficacious counsel. The 
most delicate task from the very first is to encourage the student: 
he must express his own thought; there cannot be any develop- 
ment or even intellectual honesty, except at this price. It is 
necessary, then, to encourage the student, to try to discover 
what there is of value in his thought, and make use of this in 
showing him by what effort he could have given his work a 
greater value. And, on the other hand, the student must be 
helped in governing his impressions, in getting away from pre- 
conceived opinions and narrowness, in judging with good sense 
and taste. The peril of teachers as well as students is always 
among fixed formulas, cut-and-dried judgments, puerile impres- 
sions, or vain dogmatism. 

At the beginning of the year, the instructor will do well not to 
give more than twenty minutes to each outline or to each read- 
ing explained; the student should be obliged to proportion his 
time for the better confirming and fixing of his thought. 

1 These are discussed in a later paragraph. 



APPENDIX 251 

Literary Readings 

The programme permits of two kinds of readings: 

The first are designed to complete the knowledge that the 
students already have of French literature. These readings will 
bring to mind again certain works that are the expression of an 
historical movement, either because they are explained by it, or 
because they have helped to create it. 

The others are drawn from the masterpieces of ancient and 
modern foreign literatures, — from the works about which 
Sainte-Beuve said, "No one is a man who does not know them." 
It has not seemed right to deprive future teachers of readings 
which, for being done in translations, are none the less sources of 
pure enjoyment and of inspiration to a more complete and a 
higher human nature. 

These two kinds of works need not be studied in the same 
manner, but both of them call for an effort to get out of oneself, 
to put oneself in another time, in another society, in conditions 
which are new for us; and it is this effort that is, strictly speak- 
ing, educative. When one perceives that he is not so much of a 
stranger as he had at first thought to the profound ways of 
thinking, of feeling, and living that are revealed to him, he is at 
the same time both invigorated and enriched. It is well that the 
student-teachers have this double experience. The instructor 
who aids them in enjoying it has well performed his duty, it 
matters little what method he has followed: it is good assuredly. 

Popular Readings 

Concerning the readings for the popular lectures, one will do 
well to consult the article by Sainte-Beuve (Causeries du Lundi), 
the pamphlet by Monsieur Bouchor, and the collection of read- 
ings published by the Philotechnical Association. One will see 
how to choose the readings and how to present them. In the 
course of the third year, groups of students will have practice in 
giving readings (recreation for the evening, afternoon, or Sunday) 
to their fellow students. Each third-year student will have 



252 APPENDIX 

charge, in his turn, of organizing these meetings, of reading the 
works, and of supplying in brief explanations the necessary 
setting and connection of the scenes or the parts read. In the 
class in literature the instructor will discuss questions of choice, 
methods of presentation, and will prepare, with students, a list 
of works, both prose selections and poems, suitable for popu- 
lar readings. 

It would be worth while to invite the oldest pupils in the 
practice-school and their parents to attend these student 
readings. 

Composition 

The pupils of the third year should each fortnight prepare a 
composition, but it may be on a subject drawn from literature, 
history, ethics, or education. It will, naturally, be corrected by 
the instructor best fitted for the task. It is not indispensable 
that all the pupils treat the same subject; it is preferable that 
the instructor often propose several to choose from, and leave 
the student free to treat one within a given time. It is sufficient 
that each composition be submitted on the day appointed. 

Grammar and Reading 

Here it is a question of exercises that are suited to the primary 
school. It is not expected that the instructor make a system- 
atic, complete course in grammar. He should not forget, either, 
that in the primary school " one must learn grammar through 
the language and not the language through the grammar." 
The instructor will choose in the programmes of the primary 
schools a certain number of subjects that he will have the 
student-teachers treat, either in the form of outlines, or in the 
form of exercises of which they should justify the choice, the prep- 
aration, and the correction. The following should be treated: 

(i) Language exercises; (2) the principal rules of agreement 
among words; (3) the principal rules of construction of sen- 
tences; (4) the formation and derivation of words; (5) gram- 
matical analysis; (6) logical analysis; (7) composition. 



APPENDIX 253 

In a second part of the recitation the instructor will direct the 
making of such readings, with explanations, as are suited to 
the primary school. 

One must not believe that this exercise is without import sim- 
ply because the pupils for whom it is designed are absent; one can 
well discuss the choice of the piece, its length, the method of 
reading and explaining, the expressions that it is worth while to 
speak about because of the audience to which one will address 
himself, etc. To require the student-teacher to read a simple 
piece well, and then to summarize the meaning, and then to 
indicate the development, is a useful exercise that may give 
rise to some criticisms as much more efficacious as they are 
immediate. The student-teacher who can best imagine what a 
pupil would say or ought to say is the one who will later guide the 
pupil best. 



INDEX 



INDEX 



Ability of the French teacher to ques- 
tion, 199. 

Academies, area of, 11. 
number of, n. 

Adjustments necessary to language 
tradition in America, 212. 

Agregation, 180. 

Arrete of July, 19 10, 96. 

Baccalaureate examination, 71, 179, 
181. 

subjects for composition in, 71. 
Bachelier, 179, 182. 
Bezard, J., 129. 
Bibliography, 243. 
Bonaparte, Napoleon, quoted, 74. 
Brevet, elementaire, 176. 

superieur, 176. 
Brunot, Ferdinand, quoted, 108. 

Certificat d'aptitude pedagogique, 

177. 
Chateaubriand, Frangois Rene de, 

quoted, 74. 
Chenier, Andre, quoted, 122. 
Class in French school, explained, 16. 
Class periods in the mother tongue, 

internal arrangement of, 100. 
Composition, the French attitude 

toward, 46. 
Composition and literature, 225. 
Compositions (see also Themes), 

subjects for, 66. 
in the baccalaurate examination, 

7i- 
Compression of American school 

course recommended, 215. 



Conscientiousness of the French 

teacher, 197. 
Contrast, the basis of word-teaching, 

54- 
Course, in the primary schools, 14. 

in the secondary schools, 14. 
Courses of study in the mother 

tongue, unity of, 15. 
Criticism of themes, constructive, 
82. 
ideals in, 79. 

methods employed in, 81. 
oral, 81. 
spirit of, 83. 

Daudet, Alphonse, quoted, 59, 103. 
Departement, division of an acad- 

6mie, 188. 
Dictation, accuracy of French pupils 
in taking, 60. 

specimens of, 59, 60. 

value of, dwelt upon by French 
teachers, 57. 

value of, in teaching spelling, 
61. 
Direct method in the teaching of 
foreign languages, 163. 

accepted in 1828, 163. 

adopted for the modern lan- 
guages in 1902, 162. 

applied to the teaching of Eng- 
lish in France, 163. 

efficacy of, 169. 

explication of texts in, 167. 

grammar in, 164. 

influence of on the mother 
tongue, 170. 



258 



INDEX 



Directeur, directrice, 187. 
Directeurs (de l'Enseignement) , 11. 
Distribution of exercises in writing, 

46, 67, 219. 
Dual organization of the French 
schools, 12. 

Ecole normale superieure, 181, 182. 
English classics, importance of teach- 
ing in America, 224. 
Enthusiasm of the French teacher, 

198. 
Examination for the baccalaureate, 
179, 181. 
per cent of successful applicants 
in, for 191 2, 180. 
Explication of texts, characteristic 
comment in, 126. 
example of, 129. 
organization of ideas in, 125. 
origin of, 123. 
reading aloud in, 128. 
value of, 148. 

word-by-word knowledge re- 
quired in, 124. 

Foreign languages, 155. 
France, Anatole, quoted, 68, 76. 
Franco-Prussian War, influence of 

on France, 6. 
Franklin, Benjamin, quoted, 105. 

Graduate study of English in Ameri- 
can universities, 233. 
Grammar, close relation of to other 
work, 99. 

complete passages of prose used 
in the study of, 103. 

early beginning in the study of, 
91. 

historical, no. 

inductive method in, 107. 

oral exercises in, 102. 



predominant purpose in teach- 
ing, 90. 
sentence, the center of study in, 

106. 
simplification in the teaching of, 
93- 
Grammatical nomenclature, simpli- 
fied and unified, 96. 
Greek, 155, 159. 

Half-tints in Lamartine's images. 

144. 
Historical grammar, no. 
Hours devoted by teachers of the 

mother tongue to classroom 

work, 190. 
Hugo, Victor, quoted, 72, 74. 

Inductive method in teaching gram- 
mar, 107. 
Inspection, 188. 

the value of, 189. 
Inspectors, n. 

general, 188. 

of the academie, 188. 

relation of to recteur, 188. 

special primary, 188. 
Instituteur and professeur, 196. 
Instructions, quoted, 49, 90, no, 
150. 

Joubert, Joseph, quoted, 72. 

Lack of language tradition in 

America, 210. 
Lamartine, Alphonse de, quoted, 13 1, 

133, 1.35, 147. 
Lamartine's diction, 139. 
Lamartinian rhythm and images, 

141. 
Language tradition in France, 208. 
Latin, 155. 

classroom method in, 156. 



INDEX 



259 



close relation of to French, 159. 
dominant purpose in teaching, 

159- 
early beginning in the study of, 

156, 160. 
Frenchman's attitude toward, 

156. 
per cent of pupils in lycee who 

take, 156. 
taught by the teacher of French, 
160. 
Latin composition, 158. 
L'Isolement of Lamartine, 131. 
Lecons de choses, 51. 
Licenci6, 180. 
Literature, 114. 

Literature and theme-writing, 152. 
Litt. D. degree, proposed as a degree 

in course, 236. 
Lycee, compared with the primary 
school, 12. 

Maeterlinck, Maurice, quoted, 72. 
Material for themes, 63. 

importance attached to, 63. 

preparation of, 75. 

sincerity the aim in assigning, 

64. 
specimen assignments of, 66. 
teacher's assistance in the prep- 
aration of, 75. 
threefold purpose in assigning, 
64. 
Memorizing, 225. 

Memory exercises in reading and 
literature, 149. 
value of, 151. 
Minister of Public Instruction, n. 
Modern languages, 162. 

status of before 1902, 162. 
status of since 1902, 162. 
direct method in the teaching of, 
163. 



Mother tongue in the primary nor- 
mal school, 246. 

Normal school, superior, 181. 
Normal schools, in the primary 
system, 176. 

Odeon theatre, 117. 

Oral composition, as preparation for 

writing, 76. 

and reading, 122. 
Oral exercises in grammar, 102. 

Pascal, Blaise, quoted, 137. 
Pensions for teachers, 194. 
Ph.D. degree, 234. 
Preparation of teachers, 175. 
Primaire, explained, 12. 
Programmes, 

for the primary schools, adopted 

in 1887, 14. 
for the secondary schools, 

adopted in 1902, 14. 
Programmes of study in the mother 

tongue, translation of, 18. 
Proviseur, 187. 

Quality, importance of in classroom 
work, 228. 

Reading, 114. 

activity in classes in, 118. 

influence of the stage on, 117. 

subject-matter of courses in, 114. 

teacher's skill in, 121. 

training in, in lower grades, 119. 
Recteur, 11. 

relation to inspectors, 188. 
Residential indemnity of teachers, 

192. 
Respect of pupil for teacher in 
France, 203. 



260 



INDEX 



Rhetorique superieure, 183, 185. 
study of the mother tongue in, 

183. 
Ribot Commission, 162. 
Rivarol, Antoine de, quoted, 5. 
Ronsard, Pierre de, quoted, 72. 
Rousseau, Jean- Jacques, quoted, 70, 

137- 

Sainte-Beuve, quoted, 69, 251. 

Salaries of teachers, 191. 

compared with American sala- 
ries, 193. 

Secondaire, explained, 12. 

Seriousness of the French school, 
205. 

Spelling, 61. 

Spirit of the French school, 203. 

Stael, Madame de, quoted, 72. 

Stagiaire, 177, 189. 

Superior normal school (see also 
ficole normale superieure), 
181, 182. 

Teacher, the French, 174. 
and his school, 203. 
foreign language in the training 

of, 176, 185. 
his ability to question, 199. 
his conscientiousness, 197. 
his enthusiasm, 198. 
his incidental teaching, 201. 
his life within the school, 187. 
his pension, 194. 
his position, 185. 
his promotions, 194. 
his relation to the inspectors, 

188. 
his relation to the proviseur (or 

directeur) 187. 
his relation to the state, 185. 
his residential indemnity, 192. 
his salary, 191. 



his standing in the community, 

186. 
maturity of, 202. 
preparation of, in the primary 

system, 175. 
preparation of, in the secondary 

system, 179. 
pupil's respect for, 203. 
training of in the mother tongue, 
178, 181, 246. 
Teachers, finding and preparing in 
America, 229. 
position of in America, 237. 
Theme-correcting, overdeveloped, 

222. 
Themes, criticism of, 79. 

economy in the grading of, 84. 
grading of, 82. 
Theme-writing and the study of 

literature, 152. 
Thiers, Adolphe, quoted, 72. 
Training of teachers of the mother 
tongue in France, 178, 181. 
compared with training in 
America, 184. 

Vocabulary, 48. 

aim in lessons in, 49. 

enlarging and organizing the, 

48. 
method of teaching, 50. 
scope of the lessons in, 55. 
study of, recommended, 220. 
value of lessons in, 56. 

Wages paid to American railroad 

employees, 238. 
Writing (see also Composition and 
Themes), 46. 
abundance of, in the French 

schools, 46, 87. 
and speaking in other subjects, 
86. 



I 



